'■* '. 






Kt. 






a-; 






THE 



FACTS AID PRIICIPLES 



OF 



GEOLOGY 



GEOGNOSY 



. OK THE 



FACTS AND PEINCIPLES OF GEOLOGY 



AGAINST 



THEORIES 



DAVID N, LORD 




NEW YOEK 
FEANKLI]N" KNIGHT 

138 NASSAU STREET 
1855 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year ISoj, by 

DAVID N. LORD. 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern 

District of New York. 



\V. H. TiNsoN, Printer & Stereotyper. 



P E E F A C E 



How is it that, at a period when unusual efforts 
have been made for the religious instruction of the 
young and the general diffusion of sacred knowledge, 
a distrust of the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures 
and doubt of their authenticity has sprung up and 
gained a wide diffusion among the classes who have 
enjoyed, in a large degree, the means of an enlight- 
ened and religious education ? Of the fact there is 
no room for doubt. It is so conspicuous as to attract 
the notice of observers in every direction, and excite 
surprise and alarm. It cannot be regarded as result- 
ing from the exertions that are made by the avowedly 
infidel to propagate their sentiments ; as their influ- 
ence is chiefly expended on those of a different 
circle. It springs undoubtedly from doctrines that are 
taught them by persons of their own sphere, and that 
enter as elements into the system of popular educa- 



VI PEEFACE. 

tion, and doctrines that, instead of being openly 
hostile to revelation, are masked under the form of 
facts or truths of natural science, metaphysics, or 
some other branch of knowledge that is not directly 
connected with religion. It were easy to verify this 
by a multitude of proofs, but it cannot be necessary. 
It is known to all familiar with the subject that 
speculations respecting the structure of the universe, 
the nature of tlie mind, the causes of perception, the 
laws of life, the principles of language, and other 
kindred subjects, are often made the medium of 
promulgating sceptical views ; and that doctrines are 
advanced by physiologists, chemists, professors of the 
several branches of natural philosophy, and writers 
on the higher metaphysics, that contravene the teach- 
ings of revelation, and naturally lead those who adopt 
them to doubt its divine origin. This fact renders it 
peculiarly important that the false prin<!iple by which 
they thus become the instruments of undermining the 
authority of the Scriptm'es should be pointed out, 
and the means indicated by which they may be 
counteracted. It is to such a pui-pose tliat the 
present work is to be devoted. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Preface 5 

CHAPTER I. 

The Geological Theory of the Age of the Earth — the Cri- 
teria BY WHICH IT IS TO BE TESTED 9 

CHAPTER n. 

The Geological Theory Contradicts the Sacred History of 

THE Creation 28 

CHAPTER IH. 

False Notions op Geology — It is not a Science — It has no 
Laws — Geologists have not an Exclusive Right to 
Treat of the Subject 49 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Principles of Geologists — Their Theory Tried by their 
own Criteria Irreconcilable with the History of the 
Creation in Genesis 75 

CHAPTER V. 

Difficulties of Geologists in respect to the Extinction of 

Light, and the Creation of the Atmosphere . . 94 

CHAPTER VL 

Difficulties of Geologists in respect to the Elevation of the 
Land from the Ocean on the Third, and the Adjust- 
ment OF the Heavenly Bodies on the Fourth Day of 
THE Creation 123 



VIU CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER yn. 

PAGE 

Difficulties of Geologists respecting the Ceeation of Beasts 

AND of Man 142 

CHAPTER YUL 

The False Theobies op Geologists Respecting the Sources 

OF THE Materials op which the Strata were FoR3iED . 177 

CHAPTER IX. 

The False Theories op Geologists Respecting the Sources 

OF THE Materials op which the Strata were Formed .199 

CHAPTER X. 

The False Theories op Geologists Respecting the Sources 

OF the Materials op which the Strata were Formed . 225 

CHAPTER XI. 

The False Theories op Geologists Respecting the Formation 

OF THE Strata 258 

CHAPTER XII. 

The False Theories op Geologists Respecting the Formation 

OP THE Strata 278 

CHAPTER Xm. 

The Materials of the Strata, Derived prom the jlnterior op 

THE Earth 309 

CHAPTER XIY. 

The Materials of the Strata, Derived from the Interior of 

the Earth 328 

CHAPTER XV. 

The Materials op the Strata, Derived prom the Interior of 

THE Earth 347 

CHAPTER XVI. 

The Materials of the Strata, Derived from the Interior of 

THE Earth 376 



THE STRUCTURE OF THE EARTH. 



CHAPTEE I. 



The Geological Theory of the Age of the Earth— The Criteria by which it is to 
be Tested. 



Among the various speculations that are adverse to 
the teachings of the Bible, and naturally lead those 
who accept them, to doubt and reject its inspiration, 
the theory of modern geology in respect to the age 
of the world, holds, we believe, a conspicuous place ; 
and from the title and air with which it is invested 
of an inductive science, from the great number of 
interesting and extraordinary facts that are alleged 
as demonstrating it, and from the acquiescence and 
sanction it receives from men of learning and worth, 
is one of the most imposing and seductive.* Geolo- 

* We are aware that this statement will be received by some, not 
simply with incredulity, but with offence, as though it carried with 
it an implication that geologists are intentionally the authors of the 

1^ 



10 THE GEOLOGICAL THEOEY. 

gists have not confined themselves to the discovery 
and description of the great facts of the science ; — 
that the crust generally of the continents and islands 



scepticism which their theory is the means of generating ; while a still 
greater number — who, indeed, are of little consideration either on 
the score of religion or learning — will denounce it as the mere ebul- 
lition of ignorance and bigotry, which the least tincture of science 
would have been sufficient to suppress. There is no class of the 
learned perhaps so intolerant of criticism in this relation as the cul- 
tivators of the natural sciences, and none who have the misfortune 
to have so large a share of ostentatious vindicators and eulogists 
among infidels themselves, and that grade of paragraphists and 
critics — whose advocacy is almost equally undesirable — who only 
forage and skirmish in the suburbs of knowledge, and attempt to 
make themselves of consequence by affecting to be the patrons of 
learning, dogmatizing on subjects with which they have little 
acquaintance, and assailing and aspersing those whom they think 
they may safely abuse. The question has been largely debated by 
geologists themselves ever since the dawn of the science, and is still 
in dispute. Scarce a volume appears on the subject without a 
chapter on this theme. Have they acquired an exclusive right to 
treat it ? Have all others forfeited their title to receive what God 
has revealed respecting the origin of the world, and to vindicate that 
revelation from the impeachment which lies couched in the geological 
theory ? If not, why is it not as legitimate a subject of inquiry and 
criticism as any other ? The extreme sensitiveness which a certain 
class of geologists exhibit on the subject is the result, we apprehend, 
of weakness, rather than of strength ; it has its origin in the consci- 
ousness that they are not able satisfactorily to reconcile their theory 
with the teachings of the Scriptures ; not in a lofty feeling of injured 
innocence — not in a cloudless conviction that their system is not 
justly obnoxious to the charge. 

"We scarcely need say that we shall not confound the distinction 
between geologists themselves and the doctrines which they teach. 
The question we are to debate respects the import of their theory, not 
their personal reception or rejection of Christianity. That many of 
them are sincere believers in the inspiration of the Scriptures and of 
genuine piety, notwithstanding their geological theory, we do not 



THE CRITERIA OF ITS TRUTH. 11 

has received its present form since the creation of 
plants and animals ; that it consists of a series of dif- 
ferent rocky and earthy beds, in many places very 
numerous and of great depth, which have either been 
deposited from the ocean or thrown up from beneath; 
that many of them are interspersed with the relics of 
other rocks, and of plants, shells, the bones of fish, 
and the skeletons of land quadrupeds, a large share 
of which are of species and genera that no longer 
exist ; and that subsequently to their formation, most 
of them have been raised into new positions, con- 
torted, dislocated, and broken into fragments ; but 
they have, on the ground of these facts, framed 
theories respecting the causes of which they are the 
result, and the sources from which their materials 
were derived, that have led them to conclusions that 
conflict with the inspired account given in Genesis 
of the creation. Proceeding on the assumption that 
they are the product of forces like those that are now 
giving birth to somewhat similar .effects, as on vol- 



doul>t ; that oa some of them that theory, nevertheless, has a very 
unhappy influence, we regard as equally indisputable. But of that 
we shall, for the present, leave others to judge, and address ourselves 
exclusively to the bearings of the doctrines and implications of their 
theory on the inspired history of the creation a-nd deluge, without 
deeming it necessary to offer any apology for stating and maintain- 
ing what the sacred word teaches on the subject, or pointing out the 
elements of their hypothesis, which are, in our judgment, at war alike 
with that record and with their own principles. To a candid discus- 
sion of the subject, no fair-n;inded man should object. 



12 THE GEOLOGICAL THEOKY. 

canic mountains, at tlie mouths of rivers, and on the 
shores of seas, thej have inferred that their deposition 
must have occupied a period immensely larger than 
that which is assigned to the earth by the Mosaic 
record. If they are the result, they reason, of the 
chemical and mechanical forces that are now in 
activity, and operating with only their present inten- 
sity, instead of being the work of but six thousand 
years, they must have required an almost inconceiv- 
able duration ; they must have been the growth of 
an incalculable round of ages.* And thence, unfor- 

* Thus Dr. Buckland says : 

" The truth is, that all observers, however various may be their 
speculations respecting the secondary causes by which geological 
phenomena have been brought about, are now agreed in admitting 
the lapse of very long periods to have been an essential condition to 
the production of these phenomena." 

" My fire now burns with fuel, and my lamp is shining with the 
light of gas, derived from coal that has been buried for countless ages 
in the deep and dark recesses of the earth." 

" We shall view them with less contempt when we learn from the 
records of geological history that there was a time when reptiles not 
only constituted the chief tenants and most powerful possessors of the 
earth, but extended their dominion also over the waters of the seas ; 
and that the annals of their history may be traced back through 
thousands of years, antecedent to that latest point in the progressive 
stages of animal creation, when the first pair of the human race were 
called into existence^ — Bridg. Treat, pp. 13, 66, 167. 

Professor Sedgwick, of Cambridge, England, holds the same theory : 
" "We see, from the form and structure of the solid masses on the 
surface of the earth, that many parts of it have been elaborated dur- 
ing successive periods of time ; and if we cannot point out the first 
traces of organic life, we can find at least an indication of its begin- 
ning. During the evolution of countless succeeding ages, mechani- 



THE CEITEEIA OF ITS TEUTH. 13 

tunatelj, mistaking that conclusion from a mere 
li}'3)otliesi3 for a scientific induction from those facts, 
and elevating it to the rank of a demonstrated truth, 
thej have exhibited geology as contradicting the 
Scriptural history of the creation, and prepared the 
way for the inference that that history is not true, 
and cannot therefore have proceeded from God. 

cal and chemical laws seem to liave undergone no change ; but tribes 
of sentient beings were created and lived their time upon earth. At 
succeeding epochs new tribes of beings were called into existence, 
not merely as the progeny of those that had appeared before them, 
but as new and living proofs of creative interference ; and, though 
formed on the same plan, and bearing the same marks of wise contri- 
vance, oftentimes as unlike those creatures which preceded them as 
if they had been matured in a different portion of the universe, and 
cast upon the earth by the collision of another planet. At length, 
within a few thousand years of the days in which we live (a period 
short indeed if measured by the physical mo7iume7its of the past) man 
and his fellow beings are placed upon the earth." — Discourse on the 
Studies of the University of Cambridge, 1833. 

"By the geometer were measured the regions of space and the rela- 
tive distance of the heavenly bodies ; by the geologist myriads of 
ages were reckoned, not by arithmetical computation, but by a train 
of physical events — a succession of phenomena in the animate and 
inanimate worlds — signs which convey to our minds more definite 
ideas than figures can do of the immensity of time.'''' — LyelVs 
Principles of Geology, p. 63. 

" We cannot but believe that every impartial mind, which fairly 
examines this subject, will be forced to the conclusion that the facts 
of geology do teach, as conclusively as any science not founded on 
mathematics can teach, that the globe must have existed during a 
period indefinitely long anterior to the creation of man. We are not 
aware that any practical and thorough geologist doubts this, what- 
ever are his views in respect to revelation." — HitchcocJi's Geology 
and Revelation, p. 22. 



14 THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY. 

For that conclusion is the logical consequence of 
their theory. It is incredible, they themselves admit, 
that the truths of science should be at war with the 
teachings of a divine revelation. It is impossible 
that God should make a communication to us through 
one medium, which he contradicts and confutes in 
another. But we know, they assert, that the great 
volume of nature, the vast monuments of the material 
world, proceeded from his hand ; and on those indes- 
tructible tablets he lias inscribed a record, which 
announces in the most unequivocal and emphatic 
terms that the earth and its organized and living races, 
with the exception of man, instead of having been 
summoned into being, as Moses relates, only some six 
thousand years ago, had at that epoch existed through 
myriads and millions of ages. And contemplated 
thus, the inference is inevitable that the contradic- 
tory testimony of Moses is false, and cannot be from 
God. That Hebrew writer, it is said, may have been 
ignorant of the date of the creation ; God cannot. 
Moses may have deliberately framed a fiction ; it is 
impossible that God should not have spoken the 
truth. 

The question then, whether the conclusion geolo- 
gists thus draw in respect to the age of the world, 
is legitimate, or not, is of the greatest moment. If 
founded on just grounds, it disproves the inspiration 
not only of the record in Genesis of the creation, 



THE CRITERIA OF ITS TRUTH. 15 

but of the whole of the writings of Moses, and 
thence, as we shall show, of the whole of the Old 
and New Testament, and divests Christianity itself 
of its title to be received as a divine institution. 
The whole Kevelation is changed at once from 
a heaven-descended reality, into a fable ; from the 
most glorious of God's works, into a device of man. 
This geological doctrine deserves therefore to be care- 
fully and effectively tested, that if mistaken, and 
unscientific, the false principle on which it proceeds 
may be pointed out, and the Scriptures vindicated 
from the objections of which it is the source : and 
that if, on the other hand, it be found to be just, 
the friends of Christianity may be apprised of the 
blow with which it strikes away the object of their 
faith. And its merits are to be determined mani- 
festly, not by specious appearances merely, plausible 
conjectures, showy hypotheses, or vague and sha- 
dowy speculations : it is to be tried by the laws of 
nature, the great facts of the strata, and tlie forces 
that are now and have been at work in modifying 
the earth's surface. If supported by these, in a clear 
and demonstrative manner, it must stand, so far as 
its truth is to be decided within the sphere of nature ; 
if not supported by them, if irreconcilable both 
with the facts of the strata and the laws of nature, it 
must fall, and the objection against Christianity fall 
with it, of which its doctrine of the great age of 



16 THE GEOLOGICAI. TffEOEY. 

the world is the source. That question we propose 
to try. 

The theory on which geologists found their infe- 
rence of the great age of the earth is, that the mate- 
rials of which the strata consist, were derived from 
mountains and continents of granite and other rocks ; 
that those rocks were gradually disintegrated by the 
action of the air, water, and heat ; that they were 
borne down from those mountains and continents by 
rains, currents, and rivers to the ocean, and distri- 
buted over its bed in successive layers ; and that they 
were at length elevated from the bottom of the ocean 
to their present position : that the agents by which 
these vast effects were wrought, were those by which 
the somewhat similar changes that are now taking 
place, are produced ; and that the number and thick- 
ness of the strata, the vast multitudes of vegetable 
and animal remains that lie buried in them, and the 
slowness with which similar processes of erosion >and 
dej^osition now advance, prove that an immense 
series of ages must have been required for their 
formation. This inference of the age of the world, 
is thus founded on a theory of the sources from 
which the materials of the strata were derived, the 
agents by which they were transferred to the bottom 
of the ocean, and the forces by which they were 
raised to their present position ; — not irrespective of 
that on the strata themselves. 



THE CEITERIA OF ITS TEUTH. 17 

On the other hand, we reject their hypothesis 
respecting the derivation of the materials of the 
strata, and the mode in which they were distributed 
over the bed of the ocean, as a mere assumption, 
inconsistent with the laws of nature, and the facts of 
the strata, and subversive of itself; and thereby 
confute the inference they found on it of the gi'eat 
age of the world, as unproved and unscientific. 

The question then we are to debate is, not whether 
the strata that have been formed since the earth was 
created, are such in nature and number as geologists 
represent ; nor whether such vegetable and animal 
relics lie entombed in them. These facts are indis- 
putable, and are admitted as freely in our reasonings 
as in theirs. But the question between us is, whe- 
ther their hypothesis respecting the formation of the 
strata is legitimate; and thence whether the conclu- 
sion which they found on that hypothesis respecting 
the age of the world, is just and authoritative. 

In order that the hypotheses and reasonings on 
which geologists build their inference of the age of 
the world, may be legitimate and fill the ofi&ce which 
they assign them, they must possess, it will be 
admitted on all hands, certain characteristics, and be 
free from certain faults. 

1. They must be consistent with — not contravene — 
the laws of nature. Geologists must not assume, for 
example, as a preparative for their hypothesis 



18 THE GEOLOGICAI. THEORY. 

respecting tlie formation of the strata, that the world 
originally existed in a state that is incompatible with 
its present natm-e. Such as that it was created a gas 
or an assemblage of gases ; as that implies that there 
was an immensely greater amomit of caloric in it 
originally than now belongs to it ; which is wholly 
unauthorized and unscientific. Geologists have no 
more right to assume that it was imbued originally 
with thousands and millions of times its present sum 
of heat, than they have to assume that it had thou- 
sands and millions of times its present bulk of water, 
air, quartz, lime, or any other ingredient that enters 
into its composition. It is against the great principle 
also, on which they proceed in their attempts to 
account for the changes which the surface of the 
earth has undergone : namely, that the efi'ects that 
have been wrought in it, were the work of identically 
the agents — air, water, and heat, — that are now pro- 
ducing changes on the earth's surface, and acting on 
their present scale both of extent and of intensity. 
It is to contradict the laws of matter likewise, to 
assume that the world was created in the form of gas. 
Matter with the exception of a few species — such as 
the elements of air and water — is raised to a gaseous 
form only by intense heat. But heat is naturally 
latent. It is developed or made perceptible only by 
chemical action. To suppose the world to have been 
created in a gaseous form, is therefore to suppose it 



THE CEITEKIA OF ITS TRUTH. 19 

to have been created in a condition in whicli it could 
not — according to tlie present laws of matter — have 
existed, except as a secondary state ; or as a conse- 
quence of tlie action of its elements on each other 
after they were created. That supposition therefore 
contradicts the laws of heat and the formation of 
gaseous bodies. It is as unphilosophical and absurd 
to suppose the matter of the globe to have been 
created in the form of a gas, as it is to suppose that 
it was created in the form of vegetables and animals ; 
organic structures which matter never assumes until 
after it has existed in another form. An inference of 
the great age of the world, founded on an assumption, 
on the one hand, of the creation of its matter in a 
state in which by its laws it could not exist, until 
after it had existed in another form ; and on the other, 
of its originally containing a far larger share of one 
of its elements than now belongs to it, can have no 
claim to be regarded as legitimate and authoritative. 
2. They must not assume as a basis of their infer- 
ence of the age of the world, that it once existed in a 
form of which they have no proof; such as that it was 
in a state of fusion ; and that a granite crust was formed 
over its molten ocean, by the cooling of its surface. 
Such a supposition is forbidden, indeed, by the consid- 
eration to which we have already referred ; that it im- 
plies that the earth originally had a far greater pro- 
portion of combustible matter than now belongs to 



20 THE GEOLOaiCAL THEORY. 

it; as at present there is not — so far as can be judged, 
— a Imndredtli, and probably not a milliontli part of 
tbe combustible matter in the globe, that would be 
requisite, if ignited, to reduce its whole mass to a 
state of fusion. On tbe assumption, however, that 
there is no lack of combustible matter in the earth 
for the fusion of all its substances ; there yet, is no 
proof nor probability that it ever was in a state of 
universal fusion. It is as impossible to prove that it 
ever was in such a state, as it is to prove that it once 
existed in a gaseous form. To build an inference of 
the age of the world on such an assumption, is there- 
fore to build it on an hypothesis, of what cannot be 
shown to have been a fact ; and that is to build it on 
nothing, and render it wholly unscientific and worth- 
less. 

3. They must not found their inference of the age 
of the world, on the assumption of a condition of the 
globe, which if it is supposed to have existed, instead 
of contributing to the formation of the strata, would 
have made their construction impossible : such as the 
supposition that the materials of the strata, were 
drawn from mountains of granite, that were ten or 
fifteen miles above the level of the ocean. The strata 
of the earth are held by geologists, to be on an 
average, about ten miles in depth. To maintain 
therefore, that their materials were derived from 
continents and mountains of granite, and were 



THE CRITERIA OF ITS TRUTH. 21 

borne from tliem by torrents and rivers to tbe ocean, 
is to imply that those granite continents and moun- 
tains, — even if tliej covered as large an area as the 
strata now occupy — were at least ten miles above the 
level of the ocean ; and if the moimtains from which 
it is represented the matter of the strata was chiefly 
drawn, were of but half, or two-thirds the extent of 
the strata that are supposed to have been formed 
from them, then they must have been elevated at 
least fourteen or fifteen miles above the level of the 
ocean. But mountains elevated to such an eno'!rmous 
height and extending over vast areas, could never 
have been disintegrated by the action of the aii', 
water, and heat. There would have been no air, 
except of the most attenuated kind, and no water at 
all probably at that elevation. On the supposition 
that vapors could have ascended to such a height, 
and fallen in tho form of snow, they would for ever 
have remained congealed. J^o heat could have been 
developed there, sufficient to dissolve them. ISTo 
rivers therefore could have flown from them, and 
consequently no detritus could have been borne from 
them to the sea, to be distributed over its bottom, 
and form layers, like our present strata. The suppo- 
sition of such mountains, as the source of the mate- 
rials of the strata, defeats itself, and renders the 
inference from it of the great age of the earth, unsci- 
entific and absurd. 



22 THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY. 

4. Tliej must not assume that tlie effects for which 
they attempt to account, are the work of agents, that 
are wholly inadequate to produce them : such as that 
the torrents and great rivers which they represent as 
having borne the materials of the strata from moun- 
tains and continents, entered the ocean with such a 
rush, as to diffuse the gravel, mud, and vegetable 
matter, with which they were loaded, through all its 
waters, and cause their deposition in layers co-exten- 
sive with its bed. ISTone of the present rivers of the 
globe enter the ocean with such an impulse. So far 
from it, the currents of all the principal rivers are 
greatly checked as they approach the sea, divided 
into numerous channels, and brought to a dead pause, 
at the distance usually of fifty to one hundred miles 
from the shore ; and consequently the detritus with 
which they are charged, falls to the bottom within a 
narrow space. The great mass of -the ocean is no 
more affected by them, than the continents are, that 
lie opposite to the points where the rivers enter it. 
To assign to the rivers therefore, or the tides and 
currents of the sea, the distribution of the materials 
of the strata, throughout their whole domain, is to 
ascribe to them an effect, that wholly transcends their 
power. 

6. They must not found their inference of the age 
of the world on an hypothesis, respecting the mode 
in which the strata were formed, instead of the strata 



THE CRITERIA OF ITS T2UTH. 23 

themselves. To found tlieir inference of the age of 
the world on the hypothesis, for example, that the 
strata were formed by the agency of heat, air, and 
water, acting only on the scale, and with the intensity, 
with which they are now disintegrating rocks, and 
bearing their detritus to the sea — is to beg at the 
outset, the very point which they affect to prove. 
For if the strata were formed by no other agents, than 
those which are now acting on the land, and the sea, 
and their deposition proceeded at no more rapid rate, 
than similar strata are now forming at the bottom of 
the ocean, then of course, a vast series of ages must 
have passed before their construction could have 
been completed ; not to say that it could never have 
taken place. But such a method of establishing the 
antiquity of the globe, has no title to be regarded as 
demonstrative or logical. Geologists must fii-st prove 
by irrefragable evidence, that the strata were formed 
by the slow process, which the hypothesis represents, 
before they can make that mode of their formation, 
the ground of an inference of the vast age of the 
world. To assume that hundreds or thousands of 
years w^ere necessary for the structure of any one 
of the layers, of which the strata consist ; and that 
therefore, as many hundreds or thousands of years 
were consumed in the construction of the whole, as 
there are layers in the whole of the strata — is to take 



24: THE GEOLOGICAL THEOET. 

for granted — not to prove the vast antiquity of the 
earth. 

6. They must not assume any condition of the 
world, the existence of any agents, or the occurrence 
of any events, the reality of which they cannot 
demonstrate ; and all their assumptions and reason- 
ings must be consistent with all the facts, and all the 
laws of nature, which the question affects. 

To these, axioms geologists themselves will un- 
doubtedly assent ; and it results from them, that if the 
strata demonstrate that the world has subsisted 
through a vast series of ages, it must be by what they 
themselves are, in composition, bulk, and number — not 
by any theory of an antecedent state of the earth, 
or the processes by which they were formed. If 
they do not prove the great age of the world, by 
what they themselves are, irrespective of any specu- 
lations, in regard to the agents by which they were 
formed, they cannot prove it at all ; precisely as, if 
the nature and number of the elements of which the 
great pyramid of Egypt consists, and the fact that it 
was erected by human hands — do not prove that 
millions of ages were occupied in its erection ; no 
theory, respecting the agents by whom it was built, 
and the method of their procedure, can demonstrate, 
that such a period was occupied in its construction. 



THE CRITERIA OF ITS TRUTH. 25 

QUESTIONS 

RESPECTING THE POINTS DISCUSSED IN THIS CHAPTER. 

What is the doctrine of modem geology respecting the age 
of the world ? What great truth does that doctrine contradict ? 
What is the mischievous influence which it exerts ? Is what it asserts, 
a geological fact that is discovered by the eye, as the natures and 
numbers of the strata are ; or is it a mere inference from an hypo- 
thesis respecting the mode in which the strata were formed ? Is the 
question, whether it is true or not, one of great moment ? What is 
the conclusion to which, if true, it must lead, in respect to the 
record in Genesis of the creation, and the inspiration of the 
Scriptures ? By what criterion is the question, whether it is true 
or not, to be tried? State the theory of geologists respecting 
the formation of the present crust of the globe — in reference, 
1st, To the sources from which the materials of the strata were 
derived ; 2d, To the agents by which they were conveyed to 
the places of their deposition ; 3d, To the scale of intensity on 
which those agents acted. Is their inference of the age of the 
earth founded on that theory ; or is it drawn from the facts of 
geology which the theory respects ? State the language in which 
geologists express their estimate of the age of the world. 

What part of their system is it that we reject? What are the 
grounds on which we reject it ? State then the question we are to 
debate. Does it respect the reality of the great facts of geology ? 
Or does it simply concern the truth of the hypothesis by which 
geologists attempt to account for those facts, and ascribe a vast age 
to the world ? 

There are certain axioms from which geologists must not depart ; 
there are certain errors into which they must not fall, in order that 
their conclusion respecting the age of the world may be legitimate. 
What is the first error from which they must keep free ? Specify 
one of their assumptions that is chargeable with that error. In what 

2 



26 THE GEOLOGICAL THEOEY. 

respect does the supposition that the earth was created in a gaseous 
form, contradict nature? Has the geologist any more right to 
assume that there was once ten thousand times as much combust- 
ible matter, or ten thousand times as much latent heat in the globe, 
as there now is ; any more than he has to suppose there was once ten 
thousand times as much quartz, feldspar, or lime ? Is it against a great 
principle on which they themselves proceed in their speculations, as 
well as inconsistent with the condition of nature ? What is that 
principle ? Is it inconsistent also with the laws of matter, to assume 
that the material parts of the earth were created in the form of 
gas ? What law of heat does that theory contradict ? 

What is the next error which they must avoid ? State an assump- 
tion that is chargeable with that error. What is the first objection to 
that assumption ? What is the second ? 

What is the third mistake from which they must keep free ? Give 
an instance of a supposition in which an error of that kind lurks. 
Why would it have been impossible that the materials of the 
strata should ever have been drawn from lands of such an elevation, 
as that supposition ascribes to the continents and mountains of the 
earth ? 

What is the fourth error which they must avoid in their specula- 
tions ? Specify one of their assumptions which is chargeable with 
that error. Prove that the torrents and rivers that convey sand, 
mud, and vegetable matter to the ocean, are inadequate to distri- 
bute them over its bed. 

Point out a fifth ground which they must not make the basis of 
their inference of the great age of the earth. What is the objection 
to their deducing the antiquity of the earth from such an hypo- 
thesis ? Prove that they assume in their premise what they infer in 
their conclusion. What must they demonstrate to be a fact — before 
their inference can be legitimate ? 

What is the last thing which they must not gratuitously assume, 
if they would make their inference of the age of the world con- 
clusive ? 



THE CEITEKIA OF ITS TEUTH. 27 

Will geologists themselves assent to these axioms? What then 
results from them in respect to the nature of the proof by which the 
great age of the world is to be established, if established at all ? 
If there is nothing in the strata themselves, that proves that a vast 
period was occupied in their formation, is it not clear that no 
hypothesis respecting the rate at which their formation was accom- 
plished, can demonstrate it ? May it not be as conclusively j)roved 
by their mode of reasoning, that innumerable ages were employed 
in the erection of the pyramids of Egypt, as that such a series 
of ages were requisite to the construction of the strata of the 
earth ? 



THE GEOLOGICAL THEOJRY 



GHAPTEE II. 

The Geological Theory contradicts the Sacred History of the Creation. 

That the theory of the creation which geologists 
entertain and hold is graven on the strata, contra- 
venes the sacred history, is fully admitted and 
asserted, not merely by those of them who are avow- 
edly sceptical, but by many who receive the Scrip- 
tures as a revelation. Thus a writer in a forei.o:n 
journal, in vindicating their theory, says : 



'&^ 



" G-eology is accused of inculcating views with respect to 
the formation of the planet we inhabit, irreconcilable with 
those statements which may be gathered from the book of 
Grenesis. 

" We have always thought the wisest and most consistent 
com'se for divines to pursue with regard to this delicate 
question, would be that of maintaining, to the full extent, 
the inspiration of the sacred volume on all facts involving 
the history, prospects, and moral condition of man; but 
allowing a greater latitude in regard to those portions which 
relate to natural phenomeiia, with which these facts are in no 
wise concerned. It seems reasonable to expect that a book, 



CONTEABICTOIIY TO THE SACRED HISTORY. 29 

intended for our moral guidance, should be exempt from 
error wherever we are to look into it for the regulation of 
our conduct ; but that the deity, who does not interfere 
unnecessarily, should have withheld any extraordinary 
assistance from such portions as relate to natural phenomena, 
in which man has no vital concern. Indeed, any revelation 
on such points as those would have been not only super- 
fluous, but subversive of some of the great ends for which 
the book of nature has been unfolded, which appears to 
have been intended to awaken our appetite for inquiry, to 
afford a fit and healthy exercise for our reasoning faculties, 
and to impart glimpses of the great designs of the Creator 
in the system of the universe. G-ranting this to be the case, 
there seems an a priori improbability that the writings of 
Moses should contain any precise information on such sub- 
jects as these ; for the condition of the globe before the 
creation of man is clearly as irrelevant to the objects for 
which revelation was specially intended, as the question 
whether the moon has inhabitants or is endowed with an 
atmosphere." — Literary Gazette, 1834, p. ItO. 

The irreconcilableness of tlie history of the creation 
in Genesis with the views of geologists, is thus exhi- 
bited as so clear and indispntable that no safe conrse 
is left to divines but to admit that those portions of 
" the sacred volume which relate to natural pheno- 
mena^^ are not inspired, nor free from error, and that 
there is an intrinsic improbability, from the nature 
of the subject, that " the writings of Moses should 



30 THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY 

contain any precise information" respecting snch 
eyents. As " natural phenomena" include not only 
the effects produced by the omniponent fiat in the six 
days of the creation, but all that were observable by^ 
the senses, and the theophanies, therefore, miraculous 
works and historical events recorded in the Scrip- 
tures ; this sweeping doctrine, which surrenders all 
that the most eager infidel could ask, would not have 
been advanced had not its author felt the most unhe- 
sitating conviction that the narrative of the creation 
in Genesis cannot be conciliated with his views of the 
facts of geology.* 



* That such is the result to which that supposition leads, is indica- 
ted by another British journalist, in animadverting on it. 

" If the Bible speaks at all, it speaks truly ; and it is utterly sub- 
versive of its authority to make one degree of inspiration for its moral 
declarations, and a lower, which is none at all, for its physical state- 
ments. Many geologists think that they can so explain the first chap- 
ter of Genesis as, without violence, to reconcile it with the known 
facts of geology ; in this there is no shadow of scepticism. Others 
go further, and confess that they have no hypothesis by which they 
can do so ; but even this, if this be all, is only a confession of igno- 
rance ; but to advance one step beyond this, is to open the floodgates 
of infidelity ; as even some professed Christians have allowed them- 
selves to do, by treating the Mosaic cosmogony as a tradition or alle- 
gory, and not as a correct record of actual facts. Thus we find the 
Rev. Baden Powell, the Savilian Professor of Geometry at Oxford, in 
a sermon entitled Revelation and Science, saying : 

" ' If we look at the actual case of the writings of Moses, it is surely 
in every way the most probable supposition that tradition had pre- 
served some legendary memorial of primeval events, and that the 
origin of the world had been recorded in a poetical cosmogony. As 
introductory to the revelation, Moses then put a religious application 



COXTEADICTORY TO THE SACKED HISTORY. 31 

Professor Sedgwick, a clergyman of the establish- 
ment and a distinguished geologist, indicates in an 
equally em23hatic manner his conviction that it is 
wholly impracticable to harmonize the sacred record 
with the doctrines of the science. He says,: — 

"The only way of esca^^e from all difficulties pressing 
upon the question of cosmogoay, is to consider the old 
strata of the earth as monuments of a date long anterior 
to the existence of man and to the times contemplated in 
the moral records of bis creation. The Bible is then left to 
rest upon its own appropriate evidence, and its interpreta- 
tion is committed to the learning and good sense of the 
critic and commentator ; while geology is allowed to stand 
on its own basis, and the philosopher to follow the investi- 
gations of physical truth wherever they may lead him, 
without any dread of evil consequences." — Discourse en the, 
Studies of the, University of Camhridge, p. 108. 

ISTo terms could show more decisively that the 
history the Bible gives of the creation, is felt to be 
wholly irreconcilable with his geological theory. 
If coincident with each other, if not in the most 
palpable collision, why, in order to escape pressing 
difficulties, assume, in direct contravention of the 

upon such memorials, for the stronger sanction of the enactments of 
that law to the Israelites, and adopted them for the illustration of 
religious truths, and as the vehicles of moral instruction to the chosen 
people.' '-—Ch. Obser., June, 183J:, pp. 369, 370. 

It is thus, according to Professor Powell, in every relation, a mere 
fiction. 



32 • THE GEOLOGICAL TIIEOKY 

fact, tliat the Bible utters nothing on the subject of 
the earth's creation ?'^ 

Though the conviction of these writers of the 
impossibility of reconcihng those two views of the 
creation, is, in our judgment, legitimate, and had 
better be acknowledged than disguised, a great 
number of geologists recoil from it, and the startling 
and self-contradictious methods proposed by them for 
evading the abandonment, with which it is felt to 
be fraught, of the inspiration of the Scriptures, and 
maintain, some on one supposition and some on 
another, that the sacred narrative and the geological 
theory are consistent with each other. 

* It is not easy, however, to see what way this expedient presents 
" of escape from all difficulties pressing upon the question." How 
is a consideration of " the old strata of the earth as monuments 
of a date long anterior to the existence of man, and the times 
contemplated in the moral records of his creation," to prevent them 
from being regarded as eonti^dicting that record ? To admit and 
proclaim that they are totally incompatible with each other, is a 
singular method of escaping the difficulties of their irreconcilablc- 
ness, or of suppressing debate respecting it ! The fact that geolo- 
gists may adopt that hypothesis respecting their reUitions to each 
other, cannot exempt the critic and commentator from the necessity 
of interpreting the Bible by its proper laws, and defending it from 
the imputation of error, which that hypothesis casts on it. How, 
moreover, is " the Bible to rest upon its own appropriate evidence," 
if that evidence is admitted to be confuted by '•' the old strata of 
the earth?'' An extraordinary expedient really of avoiding an 
impeachment of the truth and inspiration of the Bible ! Professor 
S. is here guilty, we apprehend, of what he denounces as a " sinful 
indiscretion" in those who attempt to evade the difficulty by 
extending the periods of time implied in the six days of the 
creation. 



CONTEADICTORY TO THE SACEED HISTOET. 33 

The principal hypotheses which have been ad- 
vanced for the purpose of reconciling them are 
stated in the following manner hj the Kev. W. D. 
Conybeare, England, a clergyman of the establish- 
ment, and an eminent geologist : — • 

" We may, perhaps, without real violence to the inspired 
writer, regard the period of the creation recorded by 
Moses, and expressed under the term of days, not to have 
designated ordinary days of twenty-four hours, but periods 

of definite but considerable length Those 

who embrace this opinion \fill, of course, assign the forma- 
tion of the secondary strata, in great part at least, to 
those days of creation, and we have the authority of several 
divines for such an interpretation. 

But " it does not seem inconsistent with the authority 
of the sacred historian to suppose that, after recording in 
the first sentence of Genesis the fundamental fact of the 
original formation of all things by the wall of an intelligent 
Creator, he may pass, sub silentio, some intermediate state, 
whose ruins formed the chaotic mass he proceeds to 
describe, and out of wiiich, according to his further narra- 
tive, the present order of our portion of the universe was 
educed. Upon this supposition, the former world, wdiose 
remains we explore, may have belonged to this intermediate 
sera."^' — Outlines of the Geology of Eng. and Wales, introd. 
pp. lix., Ix. 

* He adopts the last of these hypotheses, as is seen from the 

2* 



B4: THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY 

These expedients, however, have only served to 
show in a more decisive manner the impracti- 
cabihty of their conciliation. Thus the assumption 
that the word day, in the narrative of the succes- 
sive apts of the creation, instead of signifying the 
time of a revolution of the earth on its axis, 
denotes a vast indefinite period of cycles, or centu- 
ries, is in direct coutradiction to the passage itself, 
which defines each of the six days as consisting of 
an evening and morning ; i. e. the period of a com- 
plete revolution of the earth on its axis. " And God 
divided the light from the darkness ; and God called 
the light Day, and the darkness he called i^ight; 
and the evening and the morning " — which were the 
darkness and light of twenty-four hours — " were the 
first day." — Chap. i. 4, 5. This is confirmed also by 
the announcement at the institution of the law at 
Sinai, that " in six days the Lord made heaven and 
earth, and the sea, and all that in them is." — Exodus 

following passage in an article from him in the Cliristian Observer, 
May, 1834 :— 

"Not the mere theoretical views of geologists alone, but the 
conclusions which appear by the most cogent logical necessity to 
result from the phenomena of the structure of the earth's surface, 
and the variety and order of the very numerous series of organic 
remains imbedded in the strata, do undoubtedly appear to require 
periods of very considerable duration, and to indicate that very 
many ages had elapsed before ' the diapason closing full in man,' a 
new exertion of the creative energy, made in its own image a being 
of higher intellectual aud moral capacities as the head of its other 
terrestrial works," P. 308. 



COXTIiADICTOKY TO THE SACKED HI5T0ET. 35 

XX. 11. As we have thus the ex;^licit testimony of 
the Most High himself that the days of the creation 
were ordinary days, to assign to the word so totally 
different and unnatural a meaning, is to contravene 
his own definition and use of it. It is, in fact, 
nothing less than to impeach the veracity of his 
declaration in one passage, in order to save his word 
fi'om a charge of falsehood in another. So self-con- 
futing a device, instead of answering its pui-pose, 
could only serve to impress those who carefully 
scrutinized it with a profounder feeling of the con- 
trariety of the two representations, and of their 
hopeless perplexity who could rely on such an expe- 
dient for their conciliation. Accordingly, though 
advanced with much confidence, and for a time 
accepted by many, it was soon seen to be untenable, 
and is now, we believe, generally rejected by 
geologists.^ 

The other expedient f — the assumjDtion that the 

* Thus Professor Sedgwick discards it, and pronounces those 
guilty ••of a sinful indiscretion" "who have endeavored to bring 
the natural history of the earth into a literal accordance with the 
book of Genesis, first by greatly extending the periods of time 
implied by the six days of creation ; and secondly, by endeavoring 
to show that under this new interpretation of its words,, the narrative 
of Moses may be supposed to comprehend and describe in order the 
successive epochs of geology." — Discourse. 

t This view is held by Dr. Euckland : — 

'• The Mosaic narrative commences with a declaration that ' in the 
beginning Grod created the heaven and the eai'th.' These few words 



36 TliE G>:OLOGICAL THEOET 

creation of the heayens and tlie eartli in the "begin- 
ning, announced in tlie first verse, was not included 
in the first of the six days' work, but took place at 

of Genesis may be fairly appealed to by the geologist as containing 
a brief statement of the creation of the material elements, at a time 
distinctly preceding the operations of the first day ; it is nowhere 
aflirmed that God created the heaven and the earth in the first day, 
but in the heginniyis ; this beginning may have been an epoch at an 
unmeasured distance, followed by periods of undefined duration, 
during which all the physical operations disclosed by geology were 
going on.'- — Bridgewater Treat., p. 20. 

It is maintained also by Professor SedgAvick and many others. 

" The Bible instructs us that man and other living things have 
been placed but a few years upon the earth, and the physical monu- 
ments of the world bear witness to the same truth. If the astrono- 
mer tells us of myriads of worlds not spoken of in the sacred 
records, the geologist in like manner proves (not by arguments from 
analogy, but by the incontrovertible evidence of physical phe- 
nomena) that there were former conditions of our planet, separated 
from each other by vast intervals of time, during which man and 
the other creatures of his own date had not been called into being. 
Periods such as these belong not therefore to the moral history of 
our race, and come neither within the letter nor the spirit of reve- 
lation. Between the first creation of the earth and the day in 
which it pleased God to place man upon it, who shall define the 
interval? On this question Scripture is silent. But that silence 
destroys not the meaning of those physical monuments of his power 
that God has put before our eyes ; giving us at the same time 
faculties whereby we may interpret them and comprehend their 
meaning. If the Bible be a rule of life and faith, a record of our 
moral destinies, it is not, I repeat, nor does it pretend to be, a 
revelation of natural science. '' — Discourse asi the Studies of the 
University of Cambridge. 

A. writer in the Christian Observer also advances it in the follow- 
ing form, quoted from a friend : — 

"I regard Genesis i. 1 as an universal proposition, intended to 
contradict all the heathen systems, which supposed the eternity of 



CONTRADICTORY TO THE SACKED HISTOEY. 37 

the distance of innumerable ages, and that, in the 
interval between that and the creation narrated by 
Moses, there was a series of creations and destrnc- 
tions of vegetable and animal races — is equally at 
variance with the representation in v. 4, 5, that the 
darkness, which was divided from the day — which 
must have embraced that of the whole space between 
the first creative fiat and the production of light — 
was called night, and formed part of the first day. 
It is also in direct contradiction to the declaration of 
the Almighty at Sinai, that " in six days he made 
lieaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is ;" 
in which the creation of the heavens and earth is as 
specifically assigned to the six days, as the plants, 
fish, fowls, and beasts are, with which the earth and 
sea were peopled. It is, like the former, accordingly 
nothing else than an attempt to bring this passage 
into harmony with the theory of geology, by 
impeaching the veracity of the other ; or to clear 
the word of God from the charge of falsehood, by 
transferring that charge to himself ! 

Apart from this consideration, also, the snj^position 

matter, or polytheism, or finy notion inconsistent with the infinite 
perfections of the one great Creator; and ver. 2 I regard as pro- 
ceeding to take up oar planet in a state of ruin from a former 
condition, and describing a succession of phenomena, effected in 
part by the laws of nature (which are no more than our expressions 
of God's observed method of working), and in part by the imme- 
diate exercise of divine power directing and creating.'' — Christian 
Observer, May, 1S34. 



38 THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY 

of such an omission is nnnatural and improbable. If 
snch a vast interval, and occnpied by such a stupen- 
dous series of creative acts, intervened between the 
fiat which called the heavens and earth into existence, 
and the six days of the Mosaic creation, why should 
the Most High, in professedly giving a history of his 
work, pass them in total silence, and frame the narra- 
tive so as necessarily to mislead his creatures in 
respect to the date and history of the earth ? If, as 
geology asserts, the strata form an indubitable record 
of those creations, the recital of them in the history 
in Genesis, so far from unimportant, was obviously 
necessary, both to his vindication, and to the just 
instruction of his creatures. To exclude it, was to 
place them under an unavoidable necessity either 
of misconceiving or distrusting him, and prepare the 
way for their being betrayed into the most fatal 
errors. For as the sole creation in our system which 
he claims is that of the six days, including the fiat 
by which the heavens and the earth were called into 
existence, if there were other previous creations 
equally important, what could suggest itself so natu- 
rally as the reason that they were not claimed by 
him, as that they were not in fact his ? But it is 
wholly unlike his procedure, and incompatible with 
his perfections, thus to place them under a seeming 
logical necessity of doubting that he is the author of 
his ow^n w^orks. The supposition of such an omission 



COXTRADICTOET TO THE SACRED HISTORY. 39 

in the narrative lie has given of the creation, is thus 
in every rehation wholly improbable. 

These considerations, then, — which are hereafter 
to be confirmed by others equally decisive and 
emphatic, — sufficiently show that the expedients by 
which it has been supposed that the narrative in 
Genesis is brought into harmony with the docti-ines 
of geology, so far from answering that end, only 
serve to demonstrate that their reconciliation is 
impossible. 

The theory of the existence of the earth and its 
races through innumerable ages, is thus in direct 
antagonism with that part of the Mosaic record which 
defines the period of the creation, and if held to be 
ti'ue, renders the conclusion natural and unavoidable, 
that that record is not. And such, it is well known, 
is the result to which it carries great numbers of 
those to whom it is taught. Wherever advanced by 
a popular lecturer, and exhibited as a truth that is 
demonstrated by the strata of the earth, there it will 
be found it has left the impression very generally on 
the hearers that the Mosaic account of the creation 
is convicted of eiTor ; and thence cannot be regarded 
as having been written by inspiration. It has, indeed, 
been so boldly and speciously taught for many years 
in books, in laboratories, in lyceums, in popular 
lectures and sermons, that it has become a very 
common impression with the young that the first 



40 THE GEOLOGIC .iL TIIEOKY 

chapter of Genesis is mistaken and without author- 
ity.* 

But that inference, if adopted, cannot be restricted 

* '• The circulation of systems of natural history contrary to the 
Mosaic revelation has been greatly extended, by representing them,'' 
as the theory held by Dr. Buckland, Professor Sedgwick, and others 
does, '' as wholly unconnected with Christianity, the certainty of 
which, it is said, is independent of that of the Jewish religion, or at 
least of the first chapters of Genesis : an assertion which even a 
number of Christian ministers have been made to believe. It is thus 
that a great number of individuals have allowed themselves to be 
carried away by pretended natural science, without being aware of 
its tendency ; that it has become a kind of fashion ; that its general 
results, exhibited as demonstrated propositions, have been circulated 
through, all classes of society ; and that, at length, the greater part 
of those who pretend to any information, are fearful of incurring the 
charge of ignorance, if they do not side with those who consider the 
first of our sacred books as a fiction. . . . The consequence is 
that men of letters who are not naturalists, putting implicit faith in 
what is so positively asserted to be the evidence of nature, have 
reproduced some arguments against revelation, which otherwise 
would not have had any influence." — De Luch Letters to Blumen- 
hach, pp. 46, 47. 

A writer in the Christian Observer, for May, 1834, says of the difficul- 
ties of the question : '' We are come to where four cross-roads meet ; 
for, first, we must deny the geological facts and inferences ; or, 
secondly, we must give up the popular interpretation of the first 
chapter of Genesis, and reconcile the facts to the sacred text by a 
new one ; or, thirdly, we must deny that the Bible touches at all 
upon the question ; or, fourthly, we must give up the inspiration of 
the Bible as to its physical statements.''^ 

" If some plan of reconciliation be not devised, we are at the 
mercy of the infidel, who, in spite of all our protests and reasonings, 
will not fail to prejudice the cause of revelation, by appeals to 
persons of education and influence, setting before them the physical 
facts and conclusions, and telling them that their religious instruc- 
tors refuse to listen to them, and instead of showing them that the 
inspired narrative is not opposed to actual phenomena, w^ould at 
once stop investigation as heretical and blasphemous." — Pp. 313, 314. 



CONTRADICTORY TO THE SACRED HISTORY. 41 

to that chapter. To pronounce the history there 
given a fiction, because of its representation that the 
heavens, the earth, and the sea and all that in them 
is, were created in six days, is to make it logically 
necessary to deny the inspiration of every other part 
of the book, and of the law that is associated with it ; 
as that representation was expressly reaffirmed by the 
Most High himself at Sinai, incorporated in the law 
of the^sabbath, and presented as the reason of the 
consecration of that day to rest; and was renewed 
again to Moses, on delivering to him the tables on 
which it was wiitten. " Six days shalt thou labor 
and do all thy work ; but the seventh day is the sab- 
bath of the Lord thy God : in it thou shalt not do any 
work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man- 
servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor the 
sti'anger that is within thy gates : For in six days the 
Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in 
them is, and rested the seventh day, and hallowed 
it." Exodus XX. 11. " Wherefore the children of 
Israel shall keep the sabbath to observe the sabbath 
throughout their generations, a perpetual covenant, a 
sign between me and the children of Israel for ever ; 
for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and 
on the seventh day he rested and was refi-eshed." 
Exodus xxxi. 16, 17. ' It is incredible that God should 
have thus with his own voice repeated that declara- 
tion on his revealing himself in glory to the Isra- 



4:2 THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY 

elitish people at Sinai, and institution of the law, and 
graven it with liis own finger on the tables of stone, 
if it was not true; if it were such a sheer and enor- 
mous error as modern geology represents. It is 
impossible from his rectitude. There would then 
have been no conceivable motive for founding the 
institution of the sabbath on such a reason. As he 
had a perfect right to establish it, independently of 
the consideration whether he created the world and 
its vegetable and animal races in six days, or any 
other period, why should he offer his having accom- 
plished it in six days, and rested the seventh, as the 
reason of his consecrating the seventh as a day of 
rest, unless he had actually wrought it in those six 
days ? ^ It is infinitely impossible that he should have 
renewed and ratified that declaration in so solemn a 
manner, and made it an element of his legislation that 
was for ever to be kept before the eyes of mankind, 
if, as geology teaches, it is confuted by his natural 
works, that are equally open to their inspection ; if 
the strata of the earth which they were soon to 
explore and read, contain a record which shows that 
the date of the creation was innumerable ages earlier. 
It would have been to overthrow his authority, instead 
of establishing it. If, then, as geology contends, the 
record on the table of the law is convicted of false- 
hood by another record which he has graven in inef- 
faceable characters on the strata of the earth, it is 



CONTRADICTORY TO THE SACRED HISTORY. 43 

impossible that tlie law can have proceeded from him, 
and the whole system of legislation associated with it 
must, like the first chapter of Genesis, be rejected as 
a fiction. To suppose it can be otherwise, is to sup- 
pose that he has, in the most momentous act of his 
administration, proclaimed a falsehood which was 
soon to be detected by his creatures, and place them 
under an inevitable necessity of distrusting his truth, 
his uprightness, and his wisdom. 

j^or does that conclusion terminate at this point. 
If that announcement from Sinai, and ratification of 
the history of the creation given in Genesis, is held to 
be a fiction, it must of necessity lead to the rejection 
of the whole Pentateuch as a fabrication. If, without 
any conceivable motive, and against every considera- 
tion that would govern a wise and holy being, a mis- 
representation so stupendous, and so sure to be 
detected and exposed, is incorporated in the deca- 
logue itself, both as it is represented to have been 
pronounced by the Almighty Lawgiver, and written 
by him on the tables of stone, what certainty can be 
felt that any of the other recitals or declarations are 
not equally false ? If no trust is to be placed in the 
awful attestations which God is represented to have 
given to that part of the law, no other attestations 
which he is said to have given the other enactments 
and institutions can be entitled to reliance. [N'either 
visible theophanies, audible voices, miracles, nor pro- 



44: THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY 

pliecies, wliicli are declared to have attended the 
communication of commands, and to have shown that 
they were from him, can yield them any corrobora- 
tion. Indeed, it wonld be absolutely incredible that 
the whole was not in an equal measure a fabrication. 
But the rejection of the Pentateuch as false in its 
claims to a divine origin and authority, would neces- 
sarily draw after it the rejection also of all the other 
books of the Old Testament ; for they all recognize 
the truth of the Pentateuch, and proceed on its histo- 
ries, enactments, and institutions, as verities. They 
exhibit the Israelitish nation as sustaining that rela- 
tion to God which the Pentateuch represents ; and 
the priesthood, the sacrifices, the covenants, the pro- 
mises, and the whole system of laws, as instituted by 
God, as that record relates. If they are not his work, 
it is impossible that the other should be. But their 
rejection draws after it also as necessarily the rejec- 
tion of the Isew Testament ; for the latter ratifies, 
in the fullest manner, all the great historical state- 
ments, enactments, and religious institutions of the 
former, and it is on them that the work of redemption 
which it reveals is founded. If the Mosaic history of 
the creation and fall, the destruction of the ancient 
world, the adoption of the Israelites as a peculiar 
people, their deliverance from Egypt, the proclama- 
tion of the law at Sinai, the institution of the priesthood 
sacrifices and rites of worship, and the interpositions, 



CONTKADICTOKY TO THE SACRED HISTOEY. 45 

commands, and revelations that are recorded by the 
prophets that followed, are not from God, it is impos- 
sible that the 'New Testament can be, whicli every- 
where recognizes them as realities, and is dependent 
on them for its truth and propriety. 

The whole Bible, as a revelation, thus stands or 
falls with the first chapter of Genesis. This inti- 
mate connexion with other parts of the word of God, 
is, in a great degree, peculiar to that record of the 
creation. The histories, narratives, and even the 
enactments of many other chapters might be sup- 
posed to be supposititious, without necessarily destroy- 
ing the credibility of the inspiration of the remainder. 
But the" subversion of this, from its incorporation in 
the law of Sinai, necessarily carries with it the sub- 
version of all that follows. 

These considerations sufficiently show, that the con- 
tradiction which the modern theory of geology pre- 
sents to the record of the creation by Moses, naturally 
leads those who assent to it, to regard that record as 
erroneous, and prepares the way for a distrust and 
rejection of the whole Bible. The scepticism which 
it is known to excite and foster, is not gratuitous 
and causeless, but the logical result of such an im- 
peachment of that part of the word of God, which 
is the foundation of all the rest. The question, there- 
fore, between the Bible and that theory, is one of the 
utmost interest. It is the question whether Chris- 



4:6 THE GEOLOGICAL THEOET 

tianity is credible and true, or whether it is contra- 
dicted and convicted of falsehood by the material 
works of the Creator. If it cannot be vindicated 
from the impeachment offered by the geological 
theory, it cannot be vindicated at all ; but scepti- 
cism is unavoidable, and nothing is left for those 
who would be consistent, but to adopt and propa- 
gate it. The subject is entitled, therefore, to the 
most serious consideration of all believers in reve- 
lation, and especially of the ministers of the gospel, 
whose office it is to teach and enforce tlie doctrines, 
laws, promises, and predictions of the Scriptures as 
communications from God. They cannot, rationally, 
satisfy themselves with mere presumptions, vague 
hopes, or undefined impressions, that the Bible is 
God's word, although it may be contradicted by his 
works. They cannot consistently act as his ministers, 
unless they can defend it from this imputation, and 
show that it is entitled to be received as a divine reve- 
lation. They cannot fulfill their duty to those of their 
people who have been betrayed into scepticism, or 
are in danger of becoming its victims, unless able to 
point out the fallacies and errors of the system which 
im2:>eaches it, and show that the works of God, instead 
of confuting or contravening it, are both in perfect 
harmony with it, and ofier it the most clear and 
ample corroboration. 



COXT]&ADlCTOBT TO THE SACKED HIST'JET. 4:7 

QUESTIONS. 

Is it admitted by many geolog^ of intelligence and reputation, 
that the theory of the great age of the world, is irreconcilable with 
Ihe lustoiy of the creation in Geneas? Is that admitted, eren by 
Ecme who EtiU regard ihe Scriptores as the word of God? How 
does the Literary Gazette account for the admifsJCHi of what it belieres 
to be a false history of the creation, into the Fentateach. while it 
gtUl holds the Bible to be in the main, an inspired book ? What is 
Professor Sedgwick's method of accounting for what he regards as 
tiie emHS of Geneas, L ii, while he reeerres tiie Scriptures in tiie 
main, as the w(Md. of Grod? Are there other geologists who maintain, 
that though ihe theray they hold of the great age of the world. Is 
apparently at i^aiance with the Mosaic higtoiy of the creati<m, it is 
not in fact irreconcilable with it ? What is the first hypothesis by 
which they attempt to prore thera to be e<niM&tent with each other? 
What is tibe other es^edient by which they endeaTor to bring them 
into harmony ? How will yon prove that the word day in GlenesLs L 
is not used to denote an indefinitely long period? How will you 
show from the nanatiTe, Geneas, i. 1 — 5, that a vast period cannot, 
according to their second hypotiiesis, have interr^ed between the 
creation announced Genesis, i. 1,, and that which is detailed; ts. 3,. 4, 
and 5 ? If such a space had intervened between the creation of the 
heaven imd earth recorded, v. 1, and the creation of lig^t reccHded, 
V. 3 — 5, is it credible that it would not have been mentioned by the 
sacred writer? Do these attempts then, fail to reconcile the sacred 
text with tiie geological thewy, and leave the ccmclusion unavoid- 
able, that if the theory is correct, the narrative of the sacred writer is 
not? But if geology inroves that narrative to be &lse, does it not 
make it impossQile to believe that the remainder of the book is 
inspired? Show how the truth of the narrative, of the ax days 
creation, is recognized and ratified in the institotion of the sabbath ? 
But if the inspiration of Geneds is given up, must not that of the 
whole Pentateuch be likewise rejected? Show how the disbelief of 



4:8 THE GEOLOGICAL THEOEY. 

the one must necessarily lead to the disbelief of the other ? But if 
the Pentateuch is proved to be uninspired, must not the claim of 
every other part of the sacred volume to a divine origin be rejected? 
Does the geological theory then naturally lead those who assent to 
it, to doubt the inspiration of the Bible ? Is the question whether 
the theory is true, equivalent to the question, whether the Bible is 
not a fiction ? la not the inquuy then one of the greatest moment ? 



GEOLOGY IS isOT A SCIENCE. 49 



CHAPTEE III. 

False Notions of Geology— It is not a Science— It has no Laws — Geologists have 
not an Exclusive Right to treat of the subject. 

Undek the conviction that the geological theory 
which thus conflicts with the word of God, is wholly 
mistaken, and may be easily refuted, and that its 
refutation and abandonment are demanded both by 
the interests of religion and the credit of geology, we 
shall proceed to point out the fallacy on which it 
rests; indicate proofs both from the record of Moses 
and from the earth, hitherto overlooked by geologists, 
which demonstrate it to be erroneous; and finally 
suggest the view of the subject, which seems to us 
to be required alike by the word of God and the 
facts of the science. 

To prepare the way for the discussion, it is import- 
ant to correct several misapprehensions and preju- 
dices that extensively prevail, and are obstacles to a 
candid consideration of the question. 

In the first place, the language which geological 
lecturers and writers are accustomed to use, has pro- 
duced the impression that geology is a demonstrative 

3 



60 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

science, haying laws peculiar to itself, that are 
verified by the facts discovered in the strata of the 
earth ; and thence, that the conclusions which they 
deduce from the strata, and embody in their systems, 
are the legitimate results of those laws, and as incon- 
trovertible as the truths that are derived from the 
axioms or principles of other sciences. 'No misappre- 
hension could be greater. Geology has no laws that 
are peculiar to itself. It professedly treats of the 
nature of the substances that constitute those parts 
of the crust of the globe that are accessible to our 
observation, and of the causes or forces to which they 
owe their present combinations and positions; and 
those forces are expressly defined as either chemical 
or mechanical ; or those of attraction, by which par- 
ticles that have an affinity are united in crystals and 
other solid forms ; and those of fire and water, by 
which they are fused or disintegrated, and transported 
from one place to another. 

This is seen from the following quotations : — 

"The history of the earth forms a large and complex 
subject of inquiry, divisible at its outset into two distmct 
branches, the first comprehending the history of the unor- 
ganized mineral matter, and of the various changes through 
which it has advanced from the creation of its component 
elements to its actual condition ; the second embracing the 
past history of the animal and vegetable kingdoms, and the 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 51 

successive modifications which these two great departments 
of nature have undergone, during the chemical and mechanical 
operations that have affected the surface of our planet. 

" In tracing the history of these natural phenomena, we 
enter at once into the consideration of geological dynamics, 
including the nature and mode of ojperation of all kinds of 
physical agents , that have at any time and in any manner 
affected the surface and interior of the earth. In the fore- 
most rank of these agents we find fire and water — those 
two universal and mighty disorganizing forces which have 
most materially influenced the condition of the globe. 

" The state of the ingredients of crystalline rocks has, in 
a great degree, been influenced by chemical and electro-mag- 
mtic forces, -whilst that of stratified sedimentary deposits 
has resulted chiefly from the mechanical action of moving 
water, and has occasionally been modified by large admix- 
tures of animal and vegetable remains," — Buckland^s Bridge- 
water T., pp. 34-31 

" It is the province of geology to investigate the an- 
cient natural history of the earth. To this purpose geologists 
must observe the effects of terrestrial agencies, both organic 
and inorganic, which are now in progress, in order to under- 
stand those which have been performed in earlier periods ; 
they must inquire what changes 7iow take place upon the 
land and in the sea ; and whether these be due to mechanical, 
chemical, or vital agency ; and compare these effects with the 
monuments of inore ancient revolutions, and thus endeavor to 
trace the physical conditions of the globe from the earlier 



52 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

period to the present date, so as to present a correct history 
of the successive steps by which it has been brought to its 
actual state, and made fit for the purposes which it now 
fulfills. 

" In the modern system of nature we recognize two great 
agencies employed in producing chauges on the face of the 
globe. Water, which wastes away grain by grain the 
elevated portions of the land, and deposits its spoils in 
lower situations, thus ever tending to equalize the levels of 
the surface. Fire, which raises matter in masses from the 
interior of the earth, and thus tends to increase the in- 
equaUties of its surface. Both of these agents are chemical; 
water dissolves, heat fuses ; both act mechanically. The 
mechanical effects of water depend on the general force of 
gravitation, and ever tend downwards ; but the mechanical 
force of heat is independent 'of gravitation, and ever strug- 
gles to overcome it." — Phillips's Guide, pp, 3, 25. 

'' Geology was defined to be the science which investi- 
gates the former changes that have taken place in the 
organic, as well as in the inorganic kingdoms of nature. 
As vicissitudes in the inorganic world are most apparent, and 
as on them all the fluctuations in the animate creation must 
in a great measure depend, they may claim our first con- 
sideration. The great agents of change in the inorganic 
world may be divided into two principal classes, the aqueous 
and the igneous. To the aqueous belong rain, rivers, tor- 
rents, springs, currents, and tides ; to the igneous, volcanoes 
and earthquakes. Both these classes are instruments of 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 53 

decay as well as of reproduction ; but they may also be 
regarded as antagonist forces. For the aqueous agents are 
incessantly labouring to reduce the inequalities of the earth's 
surface to a level ; while the igneous are equally active in 
restoring the unevenness of the external crust, partly by 
heaping up new matter in certain localities, and partly by 
depressing one portion and forcing out another of the earth's 
envelope." — LyeWs Principles, p. 191. 

Sir Charles Lyell holds not only that all the facts 
which it is the province of the science to explain, are 
to be referred to these causes, but that they are to be 
regarded as having been produced by an agency of 
essentially the same energy as that by which these 
causes are now giving birth to similar effects; as the 
result " of one uniform system of change in the 
animate and inanimate world," that has been in 
progress " from the remotest periods," and is to 
continue through all future time. — P. 188. 

The following is from Mr. Macculloch: — 

"The materials of this inquiry are objects and actions ; 
the result constitutes inferences ; and these are retro- 
spective, as well as present and future. The retrospect is 
the material for a theory of the earth. 

OBJECTS. 

" The objects arc the materials of the earth ; the m.aterials 
are rocks and fragments. Rocks and the larger fragments 



54r FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

are composed of earths or of minerals, and of animal and 
vegetable matters compacted. They are compacted by 
mechanical a^jproximatmi, or hy chemical action, or by both 
united. 

ACTIONS. 

" Actions are the results of animal and vegetable life and 
destruction, of water and the force of gravity, or of Jire. By 
organic production and destruction its objects become por- 
tions of the fragments, or form strata, or parts of these. 
By water and gravity the sohd rocks are broken into frag- 
ments, and deposited on the land or beneath the water. 
By water animal remains are mineralized, and vegetable 
ones bituminized. Fire acts in volcanoes which are visible 
or invisible. It elevates the superincumbent materials of 
the earth, whether solid or otherwise. 

RETROSPECT. 

" The inferences from objects and actions connect the pre- 
sent with the past. The fragments and solution of former 
rocks and earths in former water, produced the present 
stratified rocks. The effects of former fire produced the 
unstratified rocks with the consequences attributed to them. 
Former races of living animals and vegetables in different 
waters and on different lands, produced the objects of this 
nature now found in rocks and fragments. The successive 
connexions of distinct parallelisms among the stratified 
rocks infer as many distinct conditions of the globe. The 
time requisite for the production of stratified rocks, and for 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 55 

the reproduction of animals and vegetables, implies long 
intervals between each condition. 

" With respect to the future, it is inferred that the 
present actions are tending to produce a new condition 
analogous to that which is just past. " — /. MaccuUochh Geol. 
vol. i. pp. 11-15. 

" A practical observer . . . needs no labored argument to 
satisfy him that if the stratified rocks were deposited in the 
manne)' the work is now going on, immense periods of time 
were requisite. Even if he admit, what we are not disposed 
with some geologists to deny, that t^ie causes now in opera- 
tion did formerly act with greater energy than ai present ; yet he 
will still see the necessity of allowing periods of time vastly 
extended to form the fossiliferous rocks, unless he admit 
without proof that the laws of nature have been changed." 
HiichaKk''s Geology and Revelation, p. 20. 

Some geologists hold the necessity of regarding the 
rate at which those causes are now generating their 
several effects, as the measure of the rapidity with 
which they produced them at all former periods as 
80 imperative, that to deny it were to strike from our 
hands all means of reasoning respecting them. 

*' All agree that the deposition of thick beds of limestone 
or clay replete with the exuviae of successive generations of 
marine or terrestrial animals, interrupted too by several 
periods of convulsion, during which the existing races were 
in many cases destroyed, and new ones afterwards substi- 



56 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

tuted, could not have been accomplished, consistently with 
the present laws of nature^ within a very short space of 
time. And if it be said that the processes which produced 
them may be imagined to have proceeded at a more rapid 
ratCj and in a different manner at that period, than they do 
at present, we reply, that such a supposition toould strike at 
the root of every species ef evidence ; for if the author of 
nature should have imparted to the constituents of the 
globe those characters and relations which at the present 
time would result from the operation of known causes con- 
tinued during a period of at least a certain duration, and 
yet have chosen to employ other agencies, of whose charac- 
ter and laws we know nothing, or have accomplished the 
whole by the immediate fiat of his omnipotence, there then 
is an end to all reasoning on the subject." — Literary Gazette^ 

1834, p. m > 

The J thus unite first in maintaining that geology 
treats simply of the materials of which the crust of 
the earth consists, and of the forces from which they 
received their present form ; and next, in regarding 
the eflects which they attempt to explain, as not 
only produced by the chemical and mechanical forces 

* He thus assumes that the causes to which the strata are to be 
referred, cannot have acted on any larger area, nor with any higher 
energy, than they now do ; and that to suppose " the processes" to 
have taken place at a more rapid rate than at present, is to suppose 
that they were produced either by agencies of whose character we 
know nothing, or by the fiat of omnipotence ; a mistake as obvious 
and absurd as it were to maintain that there can be no diversity in 
the strength and activity of chemical and mechanical forces. 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 67 

that are now giving birth to somewhat similar changes 
on the earth's surface, but by agencies of essentially 
the same energy as those which they are now exert- 
ing. 

Geology, it is thus seen from these statements of 
its objects, is not a demonstrative science. It is not 
a system of principles or laws by which a share of 
the great processes of nature are explained, and can, 
like the movements of the bodies of the solar system, 
be made the subject of exact calculation, and traced 
back through the past, or forward to the future. In- 
stead, it is a mere statement or description of the 
stratified and other rocks which compose the crust of 
the globe, with a reference of them to the agents by 
which they are supposed to have been produced. It 
has no axioms or principles that are peculiar to itself, 
as the laws of optics are to light, and of gravity and 
motion to the phenomena of the solar system. In 
chemistry, experiments are made by which it is 
ascertained what substances have such an affinity for 
each other as to enter into combination; what the 
circumstances are in which their attractive powers 
act, what the proportions are in which they unite, 
and what the forms are which they assume. In like 
manner experiments have been made with bodies 
dropped from a height, and projected into the atmos- 
phere, by which it has been ascertained what the 
motions are of bodies in space acted on by gravity, 

3* 



58 . FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

and by gravity and a projectile force; and tlie laws 
of those motions taken as indicating tlie laws of all 
material bodies moving in space, have been general- 
ized and employed in the solution of the movements 
of the bodies of the solar system. But no- analogous 
experiments are made in geology, by which it is ascer- 
tained from what quarter materials must be drawn to 
form such strata as those of which the transition, car- 
boniferous, and tertiary systems consist, or what the 
periods are which are required for their formation. 
'No laws, consequently, can be deduced from the 
strata themselves by which it can be demonstrated, 
that vast periods have been employed in their depo- 
sition. They present no data from which that con- 
clusion can be scientifically deduced. If drawn at 
all as a logical conclusion from a premise, it must be 
from an assumption or hypothesis, not from an ascer- 
tained fact or demonstrated law of such formations. 

Geology, indeed, has no axioms, or generalized 
facts whatever, except those, first, which respect the 
materials of which the different strata of the earth 
consist; secondly, the relations which they sustain to 
each other, or the order in which they are super- 
imposed; and, thirdly, the agents or media through 
which they were formed and placed in their present 
positions ; and they furnish no means of a scientific 
demonstration of a different and higher class of 
truths, such as the existence of the world throus^h an 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 59 

immeasurable round of ages. The facts, for example, 
that the strata are often very numerous and of great 
thickness, that thej consist of certain substances, 
and are arranged in a specific or uniform order, is no 
basis for the logical deduction of such a conclusion, 
just as the fact that the great pyramid of Egypt con- 
sists of a certain series of stones of certain specific 
characters, and arranged in a certain order, is no 
logical ground for the inference that a vast series of 
ages was occupied in its erection — inasmuch as the 
time required for its formation did not depend on the 
magnitude of the effect, but on the measure of the 
forces by which it was accomplished. 

It is not, therefore, a demonstrative science, in the 
usual sense of the term. Its facts do not furnish the 
media of deducing a set of general laws peculiar to 
itself, by which all the phenomena of which it treats 
can be explained. And consequently, it cannot, by 
possibility, furnish a scientific confutation of the 
Mosaic account of the creation. The fancy of such 
a demonstration is a mere fallacy, veiled tinder the 
forms of a philosophical induction ; and stated arith- 
metically, is simply equivalent to the following 
problem in the rule of three : — As the depth of the 
primary strata or any one of them is to the period 
which was employed in its formation, so is the 
depth of the whole series to the periods which their 
deposition occupied — in which, as the second term, 



60 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

on which the problem turns, mnst be arbitrarily 
assumed, or guessed on only probable grounds, the 
result, instead of being scientifically demonstrated, 
is necessarily a mere deduction from a conjecture, 
and without value. 

Geology, accordingly, in place of a systematic 
body of truths deduced from a few primary axioms 
or laws, that are demonstrated by experiment, and 
furnish a scientific sohition of all the phenomena 
presented by tlie strata of the earth, consists only of 
facts or truths that are ascertained by obsei'^ation. 
It is no more a demonstrative science than any other 
branch of knowledge that is acquired solely by that 
method, such as the topography of countries. The 
investigation of the fallen capitals of Assyria, by 
Botta, Layard, and others, and their statements 
respecting their date and destruction, present a 
very exact parallel to it. Instead of an affair of 
axioms or laws, it is simply a question of substances 
and their relations and conditions, that is determined 
by inspection. It is entitled, therefore, to the name 
of a science in no higher sense than that it presents 
a minute and accurate description of the elements 
of which the crust of the earth is composed, the 
order in which the strata are arranged, their depth 
and extent, and the vegetable and animal relics that 
are imbedded in them, and in some instances gives a 
probable hypothesis of the sources whence their 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 61 

materials were drawn, the means by which they 
were originally arranged horizontally, and the forces 
by which they have since been modified in structure, 
and thrown into their present conditions. To accom- 
plish anything beyond this, to demonstrate that the 
date of the creation was infinite ages ago, is wholly 
without its sphere. It might almost as well be 
assigned the task of determining any other date in 
chronology, or resolving any other question with 
which it has no logical connexion. 

Another impression that needs to be corrected, to 
which the language and representations of writers 
on the subject have given birth, is, that no person 
can be competent to offer objections to the theories 
that are formed respecting it, except professed geolo- 
gists themselves. An attempt by men of other 
pursuits to controvert their deductions, and espe- 
cially by expositors and theologians, is treated as an 
ill-judged and absurd intrusion into a sphere for 
which they can have no qualifications — as nothing 
else indeed than an attempt to solve the problems of 
one branch of knowledge by the principles of 
another with which it has no affinity. It is, accord- 
ingly, often met by mere appeals to prejudice, 
repelled with sneers as unworthy of consideration, 
or denounced in terms of discourtesy and passion 
quite inconsistent with the calmness and impartiality 
of philosophers who regard themselves as able to 



62 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

verify their doctrines by scientific processes, that 
have the force of unanswerable demonstration. That 
the works that are usually quoted as specimens of 
the ill-judged attempts of " the divine and man of 
letters " to treat of the subject, such as those of 
Penn, JSTolon, and Cole^ betray a very unfortunate 
inacqaintance vrith many of the topics which they 
discuss, and indulge in unjustifiable imputations on 
those whom they assail, we shall not deny. That 
they undertook a task for which they were inade- 
quately qualified, is no ground, however, for the 
conclusion that no others who are not professors of 
the science can be warranted in discussing it. Great 
as their errors are, they are not greater than those 
into which some of the geologists of their period 
fell ; nor do the asperities in which they indulged, 
transcend those that have disfigured the contro- 
versies which geologists have waged with each 
other. The objection is absm'd indeed, in the 
absolute form in which it is often presented, inas- 
much as the question whether an argument against 
the geological theory is entitled to consideration or 
not, must depend on its character, not on the class 
from which it proceeds. 

In the first place, this opposition to the criticism 
of their theory by any except of their own profession, 
is chargeable with much the same incOnsideration 
and injustice which they impute to the divines who 



IT 13 NOT A SCIENCE. 63 

venture to arraign tlieir doctrines at tlie bar of the 
Bible, and show that they contradict the history God 
has there given of the work of the creation. For it 
certainly lies within the proper province of the sacred 
interpreter and theologian to ascertain what the 
import is of the record in Genesis, and of other parts 
of the sacred volume which treat of the creation, and 
to determine whether the dogmas of geology contra- 
vene it or not. They do not step out of their sphere 
in that part of their labors. It is their proper and 
peculiar province. They are equally in their sphere 
also when, on finding that the teachings of the sacred 
word are contradicted by the speculations of geolo- 
gists, they point out the error, and defend the Bible 
from the inferences which might otherwise be drawn 
against its inspiration. It is a task to which their 
profession directly calls them, and which they cannot 
refuse to fulfill, without a gi'oss dereliction of their 
office. When, therefore, these objectors charge them 
in doing this with transcending their proper profes- 
sion, they are themselves guilty of the unfairness 
which they unjustly im]3ute to them. It is the mere 
geologist, plainly, who quits his proper sphere, Vvdien 
he attempts to decide that the record of the creation 
in Genesis is not inconsistent with his theory of the 
age of the world — ^not the philologist and theologian 
who venture to decide that it is. How is it that geo- 
logists have any higher right to determine what the 



64: FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

meaning of the first chapter of Genesis is, than divines 
have to pronounce on the true theory of geology ? 
How, indeed, is it that they have an exclusive title to 
treat of the subject, while divines are guilty of tran- 
scending their province, when they venture to inter- 
pret and maintain what God has revealed respecting 
the creation ? This important question seems not to 
have occurred to these objectors ; bu'c while in effect 
denying to divines the right not only to treat of geo- 
logy, but even to interpret and teach the word of 
God, which is the peculiar business of their office, 
tbey themselves not only claim it as their special 
function to treat authoritatively of geology, but usm*p 
the right also of determining the philological mean- 
ing of the inspired history of the creation, which lies 
out of their peculiar s]3here. 

This objection, then, to the interference of divines 
and philologists with the subject, so far as the inter- 
pretation of the first chapter of Genesis, and a protest 
against the theories of geology which contradict the 
testimony God has there given, are concerned, should 
be w^ithdrawn. It is not only unauthorized and 
unjust, but it is more obnoxious to the charge of 
illiberality and intolerance, than the most intempe- 
rate denunciations in which " the divine and man of 
letters" have indulged, whom they S]3urn with so 
much contemptuousness and resentment. 

In the next place, the objection indicates an unfor- 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. '^ 65 

tunate misappreliension of the premise from whicli 
geologists deduce the vast age they ascribe to the 
world. The J proceed in it as though there were a 
class of direct and specific evidences of the exis- 
tence of the earth through vast periods, graven, as it 
were, on the strata themselves, that can be learned 
only by inspection, in the same manner as the num- 
ber, position, depth, and contents of the strata them- 
selves are. But that is altogether mistaken. The 
age of the strata is not to be ascertained by the ham- 
mer or pickaxe, by chemical analysis, by touch, or by 
inspection. The chronology which they represent as 
inscribed on the rocks, instead of being wrought by 
the finger of the Almighty, is the work in a great 
measure of metaphor and fancy. The strata them- 
selves are not, in fact, the premise from which they 
deduce the age they ascribe to the earth. They fur- 
nish no direct data for such a conclusion*, as may be 
seen from the form the argument from them assumes, 
as in the following premise and conclusion. 

The strata which have been deposited since the 
creation of the earth are numerous, and in many 
places of great depth, and are interspersed with 
vegetable and animal fossils, which indicate that 
much time was occupied in their formation. There- 
fore the creation itself must have tal^en place innu- 
merable ages ago. 

But this inference is plainly irrelevant to tho 



66 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

premise. There is nothing in the facts stated in the 
proposition that can generate such a conclusion. 
Inasmuch as the period occupied in the deposition of 
the strata is not determinable from their number, 
depth, and contents, but depends on the species and 
energy of the agents by which they were formed ; 
to treat the inference from such an irrelative premise 
as a truth established by scientific deduction, is an 
extraordinary inaccuracy. Instead of being graven 
in legible characters on the strata themselves, or 
directly deduced from the facts of geology, their 
alleged chronology of the world is in reality drawn 
from a mere hyjpotliesis respecting the forces or 
processes by which the strata were constituted, as is 
seen from their ' argument when expressed in a 
syllogistic form. 

Each of the several strata deposited since the 
creation of vegetables and animals, having been 
formed by essentially the same forces as are now in 
activity, and thence by a very slow process, must 
have occupied a long period. 

But in many localities the series of separate beds 
amounts to several hundreds and even thousands. 

Therefore the period which the deposition of the 
whole series has occupied, must be immense beyond 
computation — ^ roimd of innumerable years — my- 
riads and millions of ages.^ 

* Thus Mr. Macculloch : " We have every reason to know, from 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 67 

This, or an equivalent proposition is tlie only one 
from wliich tliat conclusion can be logically deduced. 
It is not possible to frame a major excluding the 
element of time, that shall be a logical ground for 
the induction of such an ao:e of the earth. But here 
the inference is drawn plainly, not from the number, 
dimensions, and contents of the strata, but from an 
hypothesis respecting the nature of the forces and 
processes by which they were formed. Take away 
that hypothesis, and the inference becomes, like the 
other, a non sequitu.r. But that hypothesis is not 
found graven on the rocks, nor is it legitimately 
deduced from them ; as there is nothing, as we shall 
hereafter show, in the strata themselves that compels 
or authorizes the assumption that they were formed 
by a slow process, but instead, their structure indi- 
cates that they were deposited very rapidly, and 
under the agency of forces immensely more energetic 
than those of the fire, water, and chemistry that are 
now in activity. 



wkat is now taking place on our own earth, that the accumulation 
of materials at the bottom of the ocean is a work infinitely slow : 
we are sure that such an accumulation as should produce the 
primary strata as we now see them, must have occupied a space, 
from the contemplation of which the mind shrinks. Whatever that 
may be, the geological depth of the consecutive series of any one 
stage of the surface is the measure of the time through which it 
was deposited : it is the measure of the duration of that world 
which immediately preceded the one of which it forms the latest 
stratified portion." — Geol. vol. i. p. 473. 



68 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

As the inference of the age of the world which 
geologists dignify with the name of a scientific 
induction, is thus drawn from a jpremise that lies out 
of the facts of geology^ and is a fallacy, it is plain, 
that philologists, and ''the divine, and man of 
letters," if logicians, are as competent to detect its 
deceptive character and criticise and confute it, as 
though they were practical geologists. It is entirely 
within their sphere as reasoners. A minute inspec- 
tion of the strata of the earth is not requisite to it. 
Though an intimate acquaintance from observation 
with all the great facts of the science must naturally 
give a more vivid apprehension and realization of 
them, yet it is not necessary in order to avoid the 
error into which geologists themselves have fallen, 
of confounding them with an hypothesis respecting 
the processes of their formation. It is not the great 
facts themselves of geology, let it be considered, that 
are in question. It is not a direct and logical deduc- 
tion from those facts even. It is only a deduction 
from an assumption respecting the causes to which 
they owe their origin, which men "of letters" and 
theologians capable of distinguishing a fallacy from 
a legitimate induction, are as adequate to confute as 
those of any other profession. That this considera- 
tion, which, of itself, overturns theii- theory respect- 
ing the age of the world, should have been 
overlooked by geologists, and an objection thus 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 69 

confidently urged which indicates such a misappre- 
hension of the point at issue, is truly singular, and 
shows that however eminent they may be in their 
peculiar sphere, it is not the part of prudence to 
acquiesce in their deductions and hypotheses, with- 
out an examination of the grounds on which they 
rest. 

But in the third place, the objection, if legitimate, 
is applicable in a large degree to geologists them- 
selves, and invalidates their speculations as effectu- 
ally as it can the views and reasonings respecting 
them, of those who are not of theii' profession. For 
what share of the facts on which geologists profes- 
sedly found their theories, have they severally them- 
selves observed ? N^ot one probably in fifty, perhaps 
not in five hundred. It is physically impossible that 
such a writer, for example, as Sir Charles Lyell, 
should have personally inspected all the localities of 
which he treats, all the processes he describes, and 
all the facts which he alleges in support of his theo- 
ries. Of the localities, those of South America, the 
islands of the Pacific and Indian Oceans, the seas, 
rivers, lakes, mountains, and plains of Eastern Asia, 
to say nothing of many others, he has never seen. 
Of the processes, many have extended through centu- 
ries, and could not have been inspected through their 
whole period by a single individual ; and many of 
the facts had their dates ages ago, and are not now 



TO FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

within the sphere of observation. And so of other 
writers. Instead of reljdng exclusively on their own 
personal investigation, they avail themselves of the 
observations and discoveries of others, and build their 
speculations with as much confidence on the facts of 
which they thus gain a knowledge, as on those which 
they derive directly from their own examination. 
And this is as legitimate, as safe, and as indispensa- 
ble as it is in mineralogy, chemistry, geography, his- 
tory, or any other branch of knowledge. It were to 
impeach geologists themselves of inaccuracy, and 
invalidate their reasonings, to suppose that the des- 
criptions they give of the facts they have severally 
observed, are not intelligible and entitled to reliance. 
"What claims can their systems have to be regarded 
as scientific deductions, if the facts on which they 
professedly found them are of a doubtful nature, or 
questionable reality ? They are not, however, gener- 
ally obnoxious in any measure to doiibt. The num- 
ber of practical geologists during the last thirty years 
has been very large ; many of the most important 
localities have been explored by the most competent 
observers, and their descriptions are distinguished in a 
high degree, by minuteness, intelligibleness, and accu- 
racy, and fully justify the use that is made of them 
by such authors as Lyell, La Beche, Murchison, Buck- 
land, Conybeare, Sedgwick, Phillips, MaccuUoch ; and 
together with theirs, and the works of other eminent 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. 71 

writers, furnish tlie most ample means to such as are 
not professed geologists, of an accurate knowledge of 
all the great facts of the science, and just judgment 
of the validity of the inductions that are founded on 
them. "Were it otherwise ; were a practical acquaint- 
ance with all the facts that are made the basis of 
theoretical geology necessary, there is not a solitary 
treatise on the subject, that would not be in a large 
measure obnoxious to the objection, and as unworthy 
of consideration as the counter speculations are of 
the mere "divine and man of letters." This objec- 
tion is thus in every relation ill-considered and unfor- 
tunate.* 

* This is verified by the mode which is usually pursued by geolo- 
gical professors, in teaching the science to their classes. It is by 
verbal descriptions, specimens, and pictorial representations, such as 
are given in books, that they present the great facts of the system to 
their pupils, not by conducting them to the scenes where those facts 
can be ascertained by inspection. Thus Professor Phillips, of King's 
College, London, and one of the distinguished geologists of England, 
says : — 

'•' Geology founded upon ohservations of the effects of terrestrial 
agencies upon a grand scale, admits of hein^ taught, first, by actual 
demonstration of the phenomena as they are laid open by nature in 
monntains and valleys,, cliffs and ravines ; secondly, by the aid of 
specimens of natural products and representations and descriptions 
of the manner of their occurrence. As we cannot transport a pupil 
to the summit of the Alps, the glens of the Grampians, or the 
caverns of the Peak ; as we cannot at pleasure show him the bold 
cliffs of Hastings, Whitby, or Charmouth, the wasting shores of Nor- 
folk, or the extension of new land along the margin of the Adriatic, 
he must be taught to reason upon these characteristic phenomena 
by the aid of pictorial or verbal representation. With this view we 



72 FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 



QUESTIONS. 

What is the first false notion that has been extensively spread 
respecting the nature of geology ? Has geology any laws by which 
it can be demonstrated that the strata of the earth were formed in a 
particular way, and that a vast series of ages was occupied in their 
structure ? What is it of which geology professedly treats, accord- 
ing to Dr. Buckland ? What is the definition which Professor Phillips 
gives of its object ? What is Sir C. Lyell's ? What is Mr. Maccul- 

found museums of specimens, publish sections and maps and models, 
and endeavor by lectures on these examples and imitations of geo- 
logical occurrences, to lead the student to the contemplation of the 
magjiificent objects themselves. Could we dispense with these artifi- 
cial aids, were it possible to compress into a short geological tour an 
actual inspection of the most important facts, much of the technical 
language which is now found so convenient might be dispensed with ; 
many explanations might be spared ; the monuments yet remaining 
of the changes which the earth has undergone, would tell their own 
history, and never require the little aid of words. But the writer 
and the lecturer must have recourse to other methods, and by a 
studied arrangement of representations and reasoning, strive to 
impress the same truths, with equal force of convictiofi, which are 
directly gathered from the more vivid, though less regular lessons in 
the glorious theatre of nature." — Guide to Geology, pp. 1, 2. 

And this, we may add, is the method also in which the professors 
of the science prepare themselves to give instruction respecting it. 
The usual course is to attend the lectures of some distinguished 
geologist, and study books and specimens. The information derived 
from the direct inspection of the strata, is slight, generally, com- 
pared with that which is drawn from these sources. And this method 
is not only as justifiable, but as indispensable to success in this 
branch of knowledge as any other. It were as absurd in a geologist, 
as it were in a chemist or astronomer, to neglect the discoveries 
others have made, and attempt to build up a system exclusively on 
his own observations. The objection often put forth with a very 
imposing air, thus shrinks, when properly considered, into very 
moderate dimensions. 



IT IS NOT A SCIENCE. Y3 

locli's ? Has it then, according to the definitions of these writers, any 
laws peculiar to itself, by which it can be proved that the strata 
were formed by the slow processes, and that the earth is of the great 
age, which their theory asserts ? If geology, then, has no laws, and 
deals only with mere facts, what are the great facts of which it takes 
cognizance ? Do those facts furnish any means of demonstrating 
the imniense age of the world ? Is it a mistake then to regard it as 
a demonstrative science ? Exemplify the fallacy of attempting to 
prove the vast age of the world by it. What sort of a science then 
is it, if it is not a demonstrative one ? Name some other subject, 
the knowledge of which is of the same kind as that of geology. 

What is the second false impression respecting it that needs to be 
corrected ? Are geologists accustomed to sneer at criticisms on their 
theory by persons of other professions, and denounce them as unwor- 
thy of notice ? What is the first objection to that course ? Is not 
the interpretation of the sacred text, Genesis i. and ii., within the 
proper sphere of the theologian ? Has not the theologian quite as 
good a right to maintain the truth of the inspired narrative against 
the speculations of the geologist, as the geologist has to endeavor to 
sustain his theory against the testimony of the sacred text ? 

What is the second objection to the claims of geologists that none 
but persons of their profession are competent to criticise their theory? 
What is the error in the reasoning by which geologists attempt to 
prove the great antiquity of the world, which shows that they them- 
selves are not masters of their own logic ? State the first premise from 
which they infer the great age of the world. Point out its fallacy. 
WJiat then is it, in fact, on which their inference of the age of the 
world from this premise rests? Is it on the facts of the strata them- 
selves, or a mere hypothesis respecting the forces by which they were 
formed ? State their argument in a syllogistic form. What is it 
now, in that syllogism, from which the inference of the age of the 
world is drawn — from the strata themselves, or from an hypothesis 
respecting the processes \yj which they were constructed ? Is that 
hypothesis, however, found graven on the strata ? Is not the infe- 

4 



74: FALSE NOTIONS OF GEOLOGY. 

rence of the age of the world drawn from a premise then that lies 
out of the facts of geology 7 Is it not, therefore, a fallacy, instead 
of a legitimate scientific conclusion ? 

What is the third objection to their claim of an exclusive compe- 
tence to criticise their own theory ? 



THE TEINCIPLES OF GEOLOGISTS. T5 



CHAPTEE lY. 

The Priuciples of Geologists— Their Theory tried by their own Criteria, irreconcila- 
ble with the History of the Creation in Genesis. 

We will now proceed to try the question between 
the Scriptures and the theory of the geologists, by 
showing first what the facts are that are indicated by 
the Mosaic account of the six days' creation ; and 
next by pointing out the contradictions both to that 
record and to the principles of geology itself, pre- 
sented by the postulates and implications of that 
theory. 

By the principles of geology are meant the princi- 
ples on which the authors of that theory found their 
systems ; or, in other words, the axioms on which 
they proceed in their explanations of the facts of the 
science ; first, that the processes which have taken 
place since the creation of the world, such as the for- 
mation of strata, and their subsequent modifications, 
are to be referred entirely to such forces as are now 
in activity, and producing similar changes on the 
earth's surface, namely : gravity, chemical affinity, 
and the mechanical forces of water and fire. 



76 THE PEmCIPLES OF GEOLOGISTS. 

Secondly, That those forces are to be regarded as 
haying acted on essentially the same scale, both as to 
extent and intensity, as that on which they have given 
birth to similar effects since the date of authentic his- 
tory, and are now producing them. 

It is on this postulate, unsupported by evidence, 
and inconsistent, as we shall hereafter show, with 
many of the great facts of the science, that they found 
nearly the whole of their reasonings. 

As it follows from this definition, that nothing falls 
within the sphere of the science, except effects that 
are the products of those forces, acting as far as the 
formation of strata is concerned, with much their pre- 
sent energy, it results. 

Thirdly, that no geological events can be assumed 
by them to have taken place, except such as may 
have been produced by those forces. As they are 
held to be the only causes of geological effects, and 
the scale on which they are now acting is taken 
as the exponent of their capacity to produce their 
several classes of effects — as well as the measure of 
the rapidity with which the processes that are refer- 
red to them have been accomplished — no geological 
changes can be assumed and made a basis of induc- 
tion, except such as may have resulted from those 
causes. 

And finally, it results also, that no geological events 
can be assumed to have been wrought by those 



THE PEESTCIPLES OF GEOLOGISTS. 77 

causes, and made the basis of induction, except such 
as can be proved from the present condition of the 
strata, to have actually taken place. " 

* It results also from these positions, not only that all effects, if 
there are such, that cannot be referred to those agents, are excluded 
from the sphere of the science, but that all those of the species pro- 
duced by them are also, that happen to transcend the eff'ects of the 
same class which they are now generating. If the effects that are at 
present resulting from those causes, are the measure of their power 
to produce such effects, then none of the effects of the same species 
that required causes of higher energy, can have been the product of 
their agency. They must lie out of the sphere of the science, there- 
fore, as absolutely as though they were the product of a supernatural 
power. This, which is the necessary result of their postulate, is 
indeed a solecism, and overturns the whole theoretical fabric which 
they have employed themselves in rearing. It contradicts the first 
great principle of inductive science, which requires that all effects of 
the same species, no matter what their dimensions are, should be 
referred to the same cause or causes of the same class. As it is 
plainly necessary that all effects that are from their nature referable 
to the force of gravity, such as the deposition of earthy and mineral 
substances that have been held in solution or suspension by water, 
which cannot be assigned to any other known power, should be 
ascribed to that force ; so it is equally that all effects of the classes 
that are produced by chemical agencies, such as crystallization and 
the union of crystallized and other solidified matter in masses, should, 
without any consideration of the scale on which they exist, be refer- 
red to those agents ; and in like manner that all of the several species 
which fire and water mechanically produ'ce, should be regarded as 
the result of their agency. The gi'eat axiom on which they build their 
speculative system is thus in contradiction to a first gTcat law of phi- 
losophy. Unscientific and solecistical as it is, however, they are com- 
pelled to adhere to it in order to give a color of validity to the con- 
clusion they deduce from it of the vast age of the world ; as the mo- 
ment they admit a sliding scale of those forces, and assume that they 
rose or sank in energy, and acted on a larger or smaller area, pro- 
portional to the magnitude of the effects that are referable to them, 
that moment they quit the postulate on which they found their deduc- 



78 THE PKmCIPLES OF GEOLOGISTS. 

Such being the great postulates or axioms which 
they acknowledge as the criteria of the truth or error 
of their inductions, let us now look at the facts 
which are presented hj the Mosaic history of the 
creation, and see how they consist with the views of 
these writers. 

"In the beginning God created the heaven and 
the earth," v. 1. By the heaven is meant, not all 
other worlds besides the earth, i. e. the universe ; as 
it is implied in the temptation of the first pair by 
Satan that there were worlds and creatures before 
this creative fiat ; and it is expressly indicated (Job 
xxxviii. 4-7), in which all the sons of God — imply- 
ing that, there were several orders of them — are 
represented as having shouted for joy when the 

tion of the immense age of the world. If it is admitted that, at the 
period when the strata were formed, those forces acted on a scale as 
much greater in extent and energy than they now do, as those effects 
are greater than the corresponding classes that are now in progress, 
the whole ground is abandoned of the assumption, that they were the 
work of a slow process, and required a vast series of ages for their 
completion. 

They do not, in fact, however, adhere to that postulate, which 
would exclude the deposition of strata and most other important pro- 
cesses from the sphere of geology, and circumscribe it to a few of 
late date that are of comparatively little moment ; but, instead, 
attempt to account for all formations of the classes to which those 
forces give birth, whatever their magnitude may be, and however 
vast the energies were that called them into existence. Some of 
them, indeed, candidly admit the impossibility of accounting by such 
slight forces for many of the most important of the phenomena they 
are required to explain, and others swerve from the conditions they 
prescribe to themselves, whenever an exigency requires it. 



THE PRINCIPLES OF GEOLOGISTS. 79 

foundations of the earth were laid. E'er does it 
denote simply the orbs of onr solar system ; as it is 
stated in a subsequent verse that the stars — by which 
are meant those that are visible to the unaided eye — 
were placed in the firmament at the same time as 
the sun and moon. Heaven denotes, therefore, 
doubtless, the vast cloud of worlds to which our 
system and the glittering arch that spans our even- 
ing sky belong, that till within a few years com- 
prised all that were known to the inhabitants of our 
world. 

" And the earth was waste and desolate," or 
unfurnished with organic bodies, " and darkness was 
upon the face of the deep ; and the Spirit of God 
moved upon the face of the waters," v. 2. That 
which is here the subject of predication is the ea/rth^ 
the same identical earth that now exists, and in 
essentially its present shape ' and solidity ; not as 
some maintain, the mere materials of which it 
consists in the form of gases, or in solution in a vast 
ocean. This is seen from a variety of considerations. 
As gravity is a property or law of all matter, the 
earth must have been subject to it from the moment 
of the creative fiat, and not only to that share of it 
which was inherent in itself, and drew its particles to 
its own centre, but that also which is exerted on its 
mass by the sun, moon, and other orbs of our system. 
It is seen, also, from its rotation on its axis. That it 



80 THEIR THEORY 

was created with that motion is shown by the fact 
that a whole night and day had passed, that is a 
complete revolution on its axis, at the close of the 
first day. It must, therefore, have been under the 
full force of the gravitating power, or its rapid whirl 
would have thrown off not only the ocean from its 
bosom into the surrounding space, but a large share, 
if not the whole, of its earthy and rocky mass, and 
left them, if the other bodies of the system were 
exerting their attractive force, to be drawn away to 
them. 

That it was then as solid as it now is, and of essen- 
tially the same dimensions and shape, is shown also 
by the fact that the ocean enveloped and formed a 
deep around it. It appears from the narrative of the 
third day that there was no dry land imtil the waters 
were gathered into the seas. The waters of the 
original deep were those that were then collected 
into seas, and constitute the present waters of the 
globe. The earth cannot, therefore, have been 
larger than it now is, or they would not have been 
adequate to cover its whole surface, and to such a 
depth as to form an abyss. Had it been three or 
four times its present diameter, they would have 
formed only a thin stratum around it. It must also 
have been in a spheroidal form, or of greater 
diameter at the equator than at the poles, or they 
would not have retained their position on every part 



IRRECONCILABLE WITH GENESIS. 81 

of its surface ; as a perfect sphere enveloped by an 
ocean of only such a depth, and revolving on its 
axis, would immediately throw its water towards the 
equator in such a manner as to uncover the poles. 
It was thus created essentially what it now is, in 
shape, dimensions, and solidity, and its waters were 
what watei*s now are, and were those of our present 
seas. 

These truths lie on the face of the narrative, and 
cannot be set aside by any legitimate process. It 
has been supposed, indeed, by some, that the lan- 
guage of the narrative is metaphorical, and denotes 
a different event from the creation of the material 
earth. But that has arisen from a misconception or 
ignorance of the nature of the metaphor. That 
figure, in the first place, always lies exclusively in 
the predicate of a proposition. The subject or nomi- 
native to which it is applied, or of which the 
affirmation is made, is always used in its literal sense, 
as in the expressions : God is a shield ; all flesh is 
grass ; the winds sigh ; the fields smile. But the 
nominative of the affirmation in the first verse is 
God, and in the second the earth. Whatever the 
meanings of the affirmations are, therefore, of which 
they are the nominatives,, tliey^ and nothing else, are 
the subjects of those affirmations ; or in other words, 
God was literally the agent of that which is 
ascribed to him ; and the earth was really the 

4* 



82 THEIE THEOKY 

subject of that whicli is asserted of it. And next, 
tlie figure consists in the ascription to the agent or 
subject to which it is applied, of a nature, act, or 
condition, that is not proper to it, but that is peculiar 
to a being or thing of a different species ; and the 
object of its use is, to indicate in an emphatic 
manner, that the agent or object to which it is 
applied, presents a strong resemblance to that which 
the terms used by the figure literally signify; as 
when a hero is called a lion, to indicate his courage ; 
and a statesman a pillar of the republic, to express 
the support he yields to its institutions. But there 
is no such transference here of the words create, 
waste, desolate, deep, waters, which are the terms of 
the predicates, from their natural sphere, to one that 
is proper only to another class of words. It is 
proper to God, and his peculiar and exclusive prero- 
gative, to create, and to create worlds like heaven 
and the earth. It is equally consonant to the nature 
of the earth to be created, and created a waste, that 
is without vegetables or animals, enveloped at every 
point by an ocean, and shrouded in darkness. There 
is no other body of which those afiirmations could 
be more truly and appropriately made. The fancy, 
therefore, that they are used metaphorically, can 
only be entertained by persons who are altogether 
unaware of these laws of the figure. The only term 
in the passage that is employed metaphorically is 



IRRECONCILABLE WITH GENESIS. 83 

face^ whicli properly denotes the human countenance, 
but is here used instead of surface, as is shown by 
the noun that follows, and does not vary the general 
sense of the passage. 

The narrative is demonstrably, therefore, literal, 
and teaches that the earth, as called into existence by 
the creative fiat, was essentially what it now is in 
shape, dimensions, solidity, and motion on its axis. 
What a crowd of absurd speculations which divines 
as well as geologists have indulged, are dispersed by 
this inspired announcement ! 

" And God said. Let there be light : and there was 
light. And God saw the light, that it was good ; and 
God divided the light from the darkness. And God 
called the light Day, and theisdarkness he called 
l^ight : and the evening and me morning were the 
first day," v. 3-5. 

This act was not the creation of the sun and other 
light-giving bodies, as they are not the subject of the 
fiat, "let there be light," and their creation had 
already been announced in the first verse ; but the 
light itself of the sun, and probably of all the other 
similar orbs which to us are fixed stars, and constitute 
the vast circuit of worlds clustered most numerously 
in the line of the milky-way, to which our solar group 
belongs ; and included not only the creation of the 
light-giving atmosphere of the sun, and all the other 
bodies of that class, but of the medium also, (yv 



84: THEIR THEORY 

element tliroughout the realms occupied by the sys- 
tem — if, as philosophers suppose, such an element 
exists — by acting on which it is that the light becomes 
perceptible. That it was the light of the sun that 
was then created, is seen from the fact that it is 
called day, in contradistinction from night. 'No illu- 
mination of the earth by other celestial bodies, or by 
other causes, ever bears that name. If an element, 
such as some hold is the instrument of illumination, 
had been diffused through space, it would not have 
been perceptible, imless acted on by the sun, or some 
similar agent. That it was the light of the sun is 
shown, moreover, from the fact that its commence- 
ment formed a morning, and that the period of its 
shining, together w^ the night, constituted the first 
day. Morning is "Sver caused by any other light 
than that of the sun. In order to a morning, evening, 
and day, the earth must, as already stated, have 
revolved on its axis ; and the space which elapsed 
from the first creative fiat to the close of the first day, 
must have been twenty-four hours, or the period of 
one complete revolution. The expression — evening 
and morning were the first day — is equivalent to the 
expression : the period of darkness and sunshine were 
the first day. It would have been to use the term in 
a double sense, to have said, night and day were the 
first day. 

These facts plainly preclude the supposition of a 



IREECONCILABLE WITH GENESIS. 85 

prior existence of the earth and its vegetable and 
animal races. The geological theory which ascribes 
to the globe a previous existence, is as directly and 
irreconcilably in contradiction to them, as it is to the 
inspired representation that the whole work of crea- 
tion was accomplished in six days. The testimony 
of the text is that the earth was created on the first 
day. The theory asserts that its creation took place 
innumerable ages earlier, and that in the interspace 
it had been the theatre of vegetable and animal life, 
and passed through a series of destructive revolutions. 
The text declares that the heavenly orbs and light 
were created on the first day. The theory asserts 
that they had then existed through a duration whose 
length we cannot estimate. 

This contradiction cannot be evaded by the suppo- 
sition which some have made, that the language is 
metaphorical. Nothing but a total ignorance of the 
law of the metaphor could have betrayed any one 
into so absurd a notion. In order to prove that the 
words light, evening, morning, and day, are used 
metaphorically, it must be shown that they are 
applied to something wholly unlike that w^hich they 
literally denote. Light, accordingly, on that supposi- 
tion, does not mean light that is perceptible by the 
eye, but something analogous, and knowledge, there- 
fore, or the means of intellectual illumination ; as 
that is the only instrument that produces an effect 



Ob THEIK THEOKY 

that simply resembles tliat of liglit on the eye. Oa 
the same principle, evening and morning must mean, 
not the dark and light portions of twenty-four hom-s 
of the earth's revolution, but analogous parts of a 
period in the existence of some other agent or object, 
such as the late and early parts of a person's life, or 
old age and youth.* The meaning of the expression, 
And the evening and the morning were the first day, 
must accordingly be : — And the old age and youth 
of the earth were the first day. The corresponding 
statement in the following verses must, in like 
manner, mean : — And the old age and youth of the 
earth were the second day, the third day, and so to the 
sixth ! And finally, to complete the climax of 
absurdity, the word day must, to be consistent, be 
taken to mean the whole period of the earth's exis- 
tence ; for what period can it be supposed to have 
after its youth and old age ? The expression, accord- 
ingly translated so as to give the terms a metapho- 
rical meaning, becomes : and the old age and youth 
of the earth were its first whole existence ; and the 
old age and youth of the earth were its second whole 



* This construction is indeed formally advanced by De Luc and 
others. *' As morning and evening are expressions used to denote 
likewise the beginning mid end either of a life, or of a certain 
period, there can be no doubt that it is necessary, without reference 
to anything but the immediate sense contemplated by the inspired 
writer, to take the days in question for indefinite periods." — Letters 
to Prof. Bliwiejibach, p. 91. 



lEEECONCILABLE WITH GENESIS. 87 

existence ; and so of the remaining four days ! JSucli 
is the absurd perversion of the passage to which this 
contrivance to reconcile it with the demands of the 
geological theory leads. It indicates a very crude 
state of the art of interpretation that writers of repu- 
tation should have sanctioned so extraordinary a con- 
struction. 

But the supposition that the passage is metaphori- 
cal is set aside by the further consideration, that 
terms, when metaphorically used, are always applied 
to agents or objects of which that which they literally 
mean, cannot be properly predicated ; as when God 
is called a sun ; knowledge is called light ; youth, the 
morning of life ; old age, its evening ; and death, its 
night. But in applying the terms light, evening, 
morning, and day, to the earth, no such transferrence 
of them is made from a different set of objects of 
w^hich they alone can be literally predicated. They 
are as applicable in their literal sense to the earth, as 
they are to anything else. The fancy that they are 
here used by that figure is thus, in every relation, 
mistaken and absurd. The contradiction, therefore, 
of the theory to the passage is direct and absolute. 

This however, is but one of the objections to which 
their construction of it is obnoxious. It is as contra- 
dictory to the principles of geology as it is to the 
sacred text. As light is necessary to plants and 
animals, and dry land also to many of the species 



88 THEIR THEORY 

that are found imbedded in the earth, geologists, in 
assuming that the earth was the theatre of vegetable 
and animal life through vast ages anterior to the 
creation here narrated, assume that light and dry 
land also existed through those immeasurable periods. 
Consequently, as at the epoch of this narrative there 
was no light in being, until created on the first day, 
and no dry land till the waters were drawn into seas 
on the third, they assume or imply that the light they 
suppose to have existed previously, had been annihi- 
lated, and the dry land submerged under the ocean. 
But those suppositions are not merely unauthorized, 
but forbidden by their principles. The axioms on 
which they professedly found their system prohibit, 
in the first place, their assuming as a ground of induc- 
tion, the occurrence of any event since the creation 
of the earth, that is not directly indicated by the 
strata themselves in their present condition. But 
they do not pretend to find any traces in the strata 
of which they treat, that an annihilation of light and 
submergence of the continents and islands of an 
inhabited earth had taken place anterior to the 
Mosaic epoch. They find indubitable proofs in the 
depths of the earth, that light and dry land were 
contemporaneous with those races ; but none that at 
a later epoch they were sti-uck from existence. The 
supposition, indeed, of the existence of such proofs^ 
in the condition of the rocks, earths, and fossils, is 



IEEEC0NCILAJ8LE WITH GENESIS. 89 

preposterous. "What conceivable effect could the 
anrdliilation of light have produced on the strata at a 
distance below the surface, to which not a ray ever 
penetrated after the superposition of the rocks and 
earths that intervene between them and the atmos- 
phere ? 

In the next place, they are prohibited by their prin 
ciples from assuming that any geological events have 
taken place, except such as have resulted from the 
chemical and mechanical forces to which they refer 
the formation of the strata. But they cannot account 
for the annihilation of light by those forces. "Whether 
it is held to be an emanation from the sun, or an 
effect produced by that orb on an ether diffused 
through space, its annihilation would involve the 
annihilation either of the light-giving atmosphere of 
the sun, and all the similar orbs of our star system, or 
else of that ether, or both. But such a stupendous 
effect could not be wi'ought by chemistry, fire, or 
water, raised to any energy of which they can be 
thought to be capable, much less in acting only on 
the scale on which they are now producing effects. 
Light itself is a chemical agent, and can no more be 
annihilated by others than it can amiihilate them. 
Water acts only on bodies with which it comes in 
contact, and fire only on such as are either in contact 
with it, or within the reach of the heat which it im- 
parts. The sphere of chemical forces is equally limi- 



90 THEIE THEORY 

ted. They are exerted only between particles of mat- 
ter that are in absolute contact, or separated from 
each other by a very slight space. JSTo greater con- 
tradiction, therefore, can be offered to their nature, 
than the supposition that the imagined annihilation 
of light was the work of their agency. It is to sup- 
pose that they extended their influence not only 
through the space that immediately surrounds the 
earth, but through the immeasurable realms which 
our star system occupies, and robbed the sun, and all 
other light-giving orbs, of their luminiferous atmo- 
spheres! A beautiful postulate, truly, of a theory which 
announces the conclusions it advances in contradic- 
tion to the Mosaic record, as the result of a " scien- 
tific induction." 

The supposition of the obliteration of continents 
and islands by those agents, acting with their present 
energy, or a thousand times higher force, is equally 
absm'd. It would involve the erosion or depression 
of every moimtain and hill, and reduction of the sur- 
face universally to a geological level, by agents, as 
inadequate to the production of such an effect, as 
they are to annihilate the light of the countless suns 
and constellations that glitter in our heavens. Do 
these writers find any traces in the condition of the 
earth of such a catastrophe anterior to the Mosaic 
creation? Did philosophers, arrogating, as many of 
them do, an exclusive right and competence to treat 



IEEEC0XCILA3LE WITH GENESIS. 91 

of the subject," ever before present such an extrava- 
gance to tlie faith of men ? 

Such are the extraordinary contradictions to their 
principles which they offer in these assumptions ; such 
the stupendous postulates, wholly unproved, wholly 
incapable of proof, and irreconcilable with the genius 
of geology itself, which, by their own concessions, 
are requisite to a conciliation of their theory with the 
Mosaic record, and which, instead of reconciling 
them, only place them in a more complicated antago- 
nism. « 

QUESTIONS. 

What is the question now to be tried ? "What do geologists mean 
by the principles of their science ? What is the first of those princi- 
ples ? What is the second ? Yfhat is or ought to be a third axiom 
of their system? What is or ought to be a fourth? Are they 
forbidden by their principles from assuming or inferring any facts 
that are not consistent with these axioms ? 'WTiat is the first state- 
ment of Genesis i. which is to be compared with their theory ? What 
is there meant by the heaven ? Give the reason for assigning that 

* It is scarcely necessary to say that this fault does not appear in 
the higher class of writers. Notwithstanding what we deem their 
errors, the volumes of Bakewell, Buckland, Lyell, Sedgwick, De la 
Beche, Murchison, Daubeny, Conybeare, Mantell, Phillips, and many 
others, instead of an affectation of knowledge, and intolerance of all 
opinions that differ from theirs, are, like the works of the great 
chemists, zoologists, and astronomers, distinguished for good sense, 
modesty, and candor. If Macculloch is sometimes splenetic and 
reproachful, he generally has the justice to vent his sarcasms on those 
of his own profession. The pretence to learning and contempt of cri- 
ticism, are generally in the inverse ratio of talents and attainments. 



92 THEIE THEOEY 

sense to the word. What is the next declaration of the sacred nar- 
rative ? What is meant by the earth ? What is the first considera- 
tion which proves that the same earth is meant that now exists, and 
essentially in its present shape and solidity ? What is the second ? 
What is the third ? Can these proofs be set aside by the pretext that 
the language is metaphorical ? State the first law of the metaphor. 
Show by it that God, the name of him who is declared to have crea- 
ted the heaven and earth, is used literally. State the second law of 
the metaphor. Show that the words create, earth, waste, waters, 
and others, are used also ia their literal sense. What is the only term 
in the passage that is used by a metaphor? Does the use of that 
term to denote the surface of the waters indicate that the other terms 
of the passage are not used in their literal sense ? What is the next 
declaration of the sacred text, v. 3, 4 ? What is it that is there said 
to have been called into existence ? Is the light of the sun and stars 
clearly distinguishable from the sun itself and the stars ? Is the fact 
that light was created after the sun itself and the stars from which it 
emanates, were called into existence, credible and consistent with the 
nature of those bodies ? What is the first reason which proves that 
it was the light of the sun that was then created, not the sun itself ? 
What other considerations prove it? Do these facts preclude the 
supposition of a prior existence of the earth, and its vegetable and 
animal races? Are the text and the geological theory here in direct 
contradiction to each other ? Designate the points of their opposi- 
tion. Can this antagonism be set aside by the pretext that the lan- 
guage of the sacred writer is metaphorical ? Show why the word light 
cannot be used metaphorically. Show why evening and morning can- 
not. Show why day cannot. WTiat further consideration proves 
that those words are not used by a metaphor? Is the construction 
put by geologists on the passage inconsistent also with the princi- 
ple on which they professedly proceed, as well as with the sacred 
text? What do they assume or imply had been annihilated ? How 
does this contradict their principles? How does their third axiom 
prove that their assumption of such an annihilation of light is unau- 



IRRECONCILABLE WITH GENESIS. 93 

thorized ? How does it show that their assumption of the oblitera- 
tion of continents and islands, and reduction of the globe to a geo- 
logical level, so that the whole was immersed in the ocean, is 
absurd ? 



94: DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOaiSTS 



CIIAPTEE Y. 



Difficulties of Greologists in respect to an Extinction of Light, and the Creation of 
the Atmosphere. 



How now do geologists extricate tliemselves from 
the difficulty in wliicli they are thus involved by the 
supposition of an extinction of light, and an obli- 
teration of continents and islands ? We might justly 
expect that it would engage their profoundest atten- 
tion, and a satisfactory solution be felt to be indis- 
pensable before those supposed catastrophes would 
be assumed to be facts, and incorporated as funda- 
mental elements in the inductive processes by which 
they rear the vast fabric of their system. 'No such 
justification, however, of the great postulates on 
which they proceed, have they thought necessary. 
Not a syllable of proof has been alleged; not a 
pretence has been uttered, that any evidence exists 
that those events in fact occurred. E'ot the faintest 
attempt has been made to reconcile them with the 
principles of geology. By most they are assumed 
without any intimation of the causes by which they 
can have been produced ; and the few who have 



RESPECTESTG THE EXTINCTION OE LIGHT. 95 

offered any suggestions in respect to tlie mode of the 
suppression of light, have only contradicted the laws 
of matter, and shown the inextricable embarrassment 
in which their postulate involves them. The exist- 
ence of light, contemporaneously with the plants 
and animals, which they refer to ages anterior to the 
creation recorded in Genesis, is fully admitted and 
asserted by them. Dr. Buckland says : — ■ 

" The first evening may be considered as the termination 
of the indefinite time which followed the primeval creation 
announced in the first verse, and is the commencement of the 
first of the six succeeding days, in which the earth was to 
be fitted up and prepared in a manner fit for the reception 
of mankind. We have in the second verse a distinct 
mention of earth and waters as already existing, involved in 
darkness. Their condition also is described as a state of 
confusion and emptiness — tohu bohu, words which are 
usually interpreted by the vague and indefinite Greek term 
' chaos,' and which may be geologically considered as desig- 
nating THE WRECK AND RUINS OF A FORMER WORLD. At tMs 

intermediate point of time, the preceding undefined geolo- 
gical periods had terminated, a new series of events 
commenced, and the work of the first morning of this new 
creation was the calling forth of light from a temporary 
darkness, which had overspread the ruins of the ancient 
earth. 

'' We have evidence of the presence of light during long 
and distant periods of time, in which the many extinct 



96 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

fossil forms of animal life succeeded one another upon the 
early surface of the globe ; this evidence consists in the 
petrified remains of eyes of animals found in geological 
formations of various ages. In a future chapter I shall 
show that the eyes of Trilobites, which are preserved in 
strata of the transition formation, were constructed in a 
manner so closely resembling those of existing Crustacea, 
and that the eyes of Ichthyosauri in the lias contained an 
apparatus so like one in the eyes of many birds, as to leave 
no doubt that these fossil eyes were optical instruments, 
calculated to receive in the same manner impressions of 
the same light which conveys the perception of sight to 
living animals. This conclusion is further confirmed by the 
fact that the heads of all fossil fishes and fossil reptiles, in 
every geological formation, are furnished with cavities for 
the reception of eyes, and with perforations for the passage 
of optic nerves, although the cases are rare in which any 
fart of the eye itself has heen preserved. The influence of 
light is also so necessary to the growth of existing vegeta- 
bles, that we cannot but infer that it was equally essential 
to the development of the numerous fossil species of the 
vegetable kingdom, which are coextensive and coeval with 
the remains of fossil animals." — Briclgewater Treatue, i. 
pp. 26, 31. 

He thus assumes as geological facts- the wreck of 
the former world, and the extinction or disappear- 
ance of light after the burial of the plants and 
animals that are found fossilized, and makes them 



BESPECTING THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. 97 

the basis of his whole system, without attempting to 
offer either the slightest evidence of their occurrence, 
or explanation of the causes by which they were 
produced. This is truly extraordinary. Can it be 
that it did not occur to him to inquire whether such 
an assumption is authorized either by the laws of 
interpretation, or the axioms of geology ? Is it possi- 
ble that he can have been wholly unconscious that the 
towering structure he was rearing had but a mere 
groundless hypothesis for its foundation, and must at 
the first shock of criticism give way and fall to ruins ? 
A reconciliation of the geological theory with the 
Mosaic record, accomplished by an assumption that 
not only is not proved, and does not admit of proof, 
but that both directly contradicts that record and the 
principles of geology itself! Was there ever a more 
singular mistake ! He can no more assume the wreck 
of the earth and the extinction of light betwixt the 
creative fiats of the first and the third verses, than 
ho can assume that originally those events were 
recorded in the text, and were subsequently erased 
by some extraordinary catastrophe. It is truly sur- 
prising that so obvious a consideration should have 
escaped' his notice, and the notice of the writers who 
preceded and followed him in this ascription to the 
earth of a long existence prior to the epoch of the 
Mosaic creation. The vast chasm which he thought 
to bridge over so easily, thus instead of supporting, 

5 



98 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

ingulfs his wliole theory. No deductions can hold 
that are detached from their premise by such an 
impassable abyss. By his failure to verify this 
assumption on which he proceeds, his argument from 
the fossil plants and animals becomes an argument 
against him, and overthrows his system. As light 
indisputably existed during the life of those plants 
and animals — and there is not only no geological 
proof that it was subsequently annihilated, but the 
principles of the science forbid the supposition — those 
vegetables and animals must be taken as evidences 
that the light that w^as contemporaneous with them, 
was that which was created on the first of the six 
days, and thence that their period of existence was 
subsequent to that date. 

Several authors attempt to justify the supposition 
that betwixt the epochs of the first and the third 
verses a vast period of vegetable and animal life 
intervened that was followed by a wreck of the earth 
and annihilation of light, by instances of the omission 
in other narratives of occurrences that are known to 
have taken place in an interval between the events 
that are narrated ; and they allege Exodus ii. 1,2, as 
an example. 

" So far from its being contrary to the usage of Scripture, 
in its succinct and even in its detailed narratives, to pass 
over much intervening matter without notice in an appa- 



RESPECTING THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. \)d 

rently consecutive history, it is one of its most remarkable 
features. We might bring numerous proofs, especially from 
the early books. Take for example the following, which we 
select because ic happens to occur near the opening of the 
very next book of Holy Writ, and is from the pen of the 
same inspired writer ; so that as far as we may safely speak 
of individual style in a volume all the facts of which were 
indited by one omniscient mind, it points out the character- 
istic style of Moses, the inspired historian both of the 
creation and of Exodus. We read thus. Exodus ii. 1, 2 : — 
' And there went a man of tlie house of Levi, and took to 
wife a daughter of Levi. And the woman conceived and 
bare a son (Moses), and when she saw that he was a goodly 
child, she hid him three months.' Now suppose this were 
all that is related respecting Moses and his family, but that 
Professor Sedgwick, following the steps of Belzoni or the 
researches of Champollion, had discovered, by digging up 
certain antique Egyptian monuments, that Moses must have 
had an elder brother, and also a sister nearly ten years 
older than himself, and had set out from Cambridge some 
fine June morning to relate his discovery to Mr. Cole in 
London. With what a burst of indignation would he have 
been met ! ' What ! interpose two children where the 
sacred text indubitably consecutive passes over all mention 
of such an event, and clearly speaks of Moses as the first 
born, and apparently as having been born within a short 
time after the marriage of his parents I Who in his senses 
would dare to put such a construction on the passage V 
Why no person, certainly, if it stood alone and bore upon 
nothing else. But if the supposed monuments were as clear 



100 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

in their indications as Professor Sedgwick considers are 
those of geology, the reply would be that though this is not 
the obvious prima facie construction, yet there is nothing 
in it absolutely opposed to the text ; and that if we do not 
admit it, the veracity of the narrative may seem to come 
into question ; but since that is indubitable, and the monu- 
mental discoveries are irresistible, this appears to be a fair 
and consistent mode of reconciling the alleged but not real 
discrepancy."— CAm^m-w Observer, 1834, p. 38 1. 

It seems to iis to indicate a condition of extreme 
difficulty to resort to such an expedient to justify the 
imagined omission in Genesis. In the first place 
there is not an omission, as this writer indeed admits, 
in the narrative of Exodus of the fact that Moses had 
a sister older than himself. The verses he quotes are 
immediately followed by the statement that when 
Moses was placed in the ark of rushes, among the 
flags at the river's bank, his sister was stationed near 
by to see what befell him, and that on his being taken 
by Pharaoh's daughter, she ran and called her 
mother to become his nurse. 

l^ext: But apart from this error, the supposed 
omission presents no parallel with that which it is 
employed to exemplify. "We have specific evidence 
from Moses himself, Ex. ii. 4, 7, 8, iv. 1-14, ISTum. 
xxxvi. 59, that he had an elder brother and sister, 
Aaron and Miriam. But we have no such testimony 
from him, or any other writer in the Scriptures, that 



RESPECTING THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. 101 

a vast series of ages intervened betwixt tlie epoch of 
the creation of the heavens and earth recorded in the 
first verse, and the creation of light narrated in the 
third ; that the plants and animals that are entombed 
in the strata of the earth had their life in that remote 
period ; and that at its close the earth was reduced to 
a " wreck," and light annihilated. To make the 
cases parallel, proofs of those events must be produced 
from the Scriptures, as direct and positive as they 
are which they present that Aaron and Miriam were 
children of the same family, and of an earlier birth 
than Moses. To assume, because an event mentioned 
in one passage is omitted in another that relates to 
the same family, that therefore events of the most 
momentous nature that are not mentioned at all, and 
of the occurrence of which no evidence exists, may 
be held to have actually taken place, though omitted 
from' the narrative of the creation, and then make 
that assumption the basis of a train of such stupen- 
dous deductions, is truly an extraordinary procedure 
in men who claim, in a measure, a monopoly of 
knowledge on the subject, and announce — HitchcocMs 
Geology and Revelation^ p. 30 — that " geology is no 
longer a bundle of crude speculations and airy hypo- 
theses, but a collection of most striking facts^ with 
inferences legitimately drawn according to the strictest 
rides of the Baconian philosophy ^ 

Tliirdly. But there is a still more formidable objec- 



102 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

tion to this imagined illustration. The event omitted 
in the narrative (Exodus ii. 1-8), presents no contra- 
diction either to the fact, that Aaron was an older son 
of the parents of Moses, or to the statements made of 
that fact in other passages ; nor does it involve any 
inconsistency with his or their nature, or any of the 
events of their history. But the supposition of such an 
interval betwixt the creation of the heavens and earth 
narrated in the first verse, and the creation of light 
recorded in the third, is in direct contradiction to the 
declaration, that the darkness which preceded that 
creation of light, and the season of light that followed 
till evening, were the first day, or first period of a 
complete revolution of the earth on its axis ; and to 
the declaration by God himself in the institution of 
the law, that in " six days he made heaven and earth, 
the sea and all that in them is," Exodus xx. 11 ; 
while the supposition of a wreck of the world and 
extinction of light after the existence of vegetables 
and animals, is in flagrant antagonism not only with 
the sacred narrative, but with the principles of geo- 
logy, and in every respect infinitely incredible. These 
instances, therefore, instead of a parallel, are of such 
extreme dissimilarity, that no one except by the most 
unfortunate inconsideration, could possibly confound 
them. What a splendid exemplification of the exclu- 
sive competence which some of these writers claim 
to discuss the subject ! 



RESPECTING THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. 103 

The suggestions they present of the modes in which 
the extinction of light may have taken place, are 
equally inconsistent with the sacred narrative, and 
with the principles of geology. Thus Dr. Buckland 
advances the supposition that it was occasioned by 
an accumulation of dense vapors. 

" If wc suppose all the heavenly bodies and the earth to 
have been created at the indefinitely distant time designated 
by the word beginning, and that the darkness described on the 
evening of the first day was a ttmforary darkness, produced ly 
an accumulation of dense, vapors ' upon the face of the deep,* 
an incipient dispersion of these vapors may have readmitted 
light to the earth upon the first day whilst the exciting 
cause of light was still obscured." — Bridgewater Treatise, 
pp. 29, 30. 

But this supposition is in contravention of the nar- 
rative which exhibits the light as called into existence 
by a creative act. Though the word translated creor 
ted is not used in the third verse, but a word equiva- 
lent to our verb let he, the sense is shown to be the 
same by the whole narrative, and by the express 
exhibition (Gen. ii. 4, 5) of the whole work of the six 
days, as a creation. " These are the generations of 
the lieavens and the earth in their creation, in the day 
the Lord God made the earth and the heavens and 
every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and 
every herb of the field before it grew." Here the 



104 DIFFICIJLTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

creation is represented as extending to the formation 
of the herbs of the field, though the verb created is 
not used in the fiat by which they were called into 
existence, but an expression equivalent to that em- 
ployed in the creation of light. " Let the earth bring 
forth grass, the herb yielding seed ; the fruit tree 
yielding fruit after his kind," chap. i. 11. Accord- 
ingly, in the description of the formation of man, both 
the verbs answering to create and to make are used as 
equivalent in meaning to signify his creation. It is 
inconsistent, also, with the representation that God 
then divided the light from the darkness, and called 
the one day and the other night, which implies that 
light had not before existed. It were an infinite mis- 
representation to exhibit that separation as consti- 
tuting them, if they had been distinguished from each 
other, and followed in a regular alternation every 
twenty-four hours through a round of countless ages. 
To assume that light Avas not then created, but 
merely readmitted to the earth \)j a dispei'sion of 
dense vapors, that occasioned a temporary darkness, 
is to assume that the day had, in fact, returned at its 
regular period during that temporary darkness ; as 
no vapors are ever known to envelop the earth so 
completely as to exclude the light. The diminution 
of light occasioned by the densest mists or clouds is 
very far short of an absolute extinction of it. Besides, 
if the sun shone in his full splendor on the exterior 



KESPECTING THE EXTmCTIOK OF LIGHT. 105 

of the imagined body of vapors, there must not only 
have been perfect day there, but his rays must have 
penetrated the body of the clouds to a great depth, 
and rendered them luminous. What a perversion of 
the passage to hold that the darkness that, wrapped 
the deep extended only a few feet or rods from the 
surface, while at a short distance above the vapors 
were basking in a dazzling effulgence 1 What a 
degradation of the sublime act of the Almighty, by 
which he called into existence the light not only of 
our sun, but probably of all the countless stars and 
constellations that sparkle in our firmament, to repre- 
sent it as nothing more than a dispersion of dense 
vapors that had temporarily intercepted his beams 
from the face of the waters ! It is a sad exemplificq,- 
tion of the perverting influence of this false theory, 
that men of the fine powers and just taste Dr. Buck- 
land usually displays, are betrayed by it into such 
misconceptions. 

It is to divest the work of the six days of the cha- 
racter of a creation, to exhibit the production of light 
as nothing more than a re-admission of it to the earth 
by a dispersion of clouds. If that assumption may 
be made in respect to light, it may be equally in 
respect to the atmosphere, the seas, the dry land, 
plants, animals, and even man. 'No reason can be 
given to justify it in respect to the one that will not 
be an equal justification of it in respect to the others. 

6* 



106 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

A sclieme must be embarrassed with fatal difficulties 
that needs the aid of such an expedient for its sup- 
port. 

But not less unfortunately for his supposition — 
there was then no atmosphere in existence to support 
vapors above the waters, and render such an accu- 
mulation of clouds possible as to intercept the rays of 
the sun ! It was not until the following day that God 
made the firmament, and " divided the waters which 
were under the firmament from the waters which 
were above the firmament," in the form of vapors 
and clouds. As, then, on the first day, there were 
no waters except those that were under the firma- 
ment, that is, the waters of the abyss, there cannot 
liave been any vapors in the space above them to 
occasion the darkness in which the deep was enve- 
loped. The supposition is as contradictory, thei'efore, 
to the laws of vapor as it is to the sacred narrative. 
And, finally, it is in contravention of the principles 
of geology, which forbid the supposition of any phy- 
sical event as a condition or basis of its theories, that 
cannot be proved by geological evidence to have 
taken place, and to have resulted from the chemical 
or mechanical agencies to which geologists refer the 
facts of the science. But what geological proofs can 
Dr. Buckland produce that, on the first day of the 
creation, a mass of vapors enveloped the abyss so 
dense as to wrap it in absolute darkness, though the 



RESPECTING THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. 107 

sun was shining above in unclouded effulgence ? Or 
what evidence can he allege that, in the total absence 
of an atmosphere, the forces of chemistry, fire, and 
water, acting with only their present energy, could 
fill the void above the ocean to a vast height with a 
cloud of vapor so dense, as wholly to intercept the 
rays of the sun. Can a greater self-contradiction, a 
more extraordinary absurdity be imagined ? Such is 
the inextricable embarrassment in which he involves 
himself by this attempt to bring the sacred word into 
harmony with his theory. 

Dr. Hitchcock intimates that the darkness was 
occasioned by the absorption by matter of the light 
that previously existed. 

" From the facts which modern science has developed as 
to the existence of light and heat in all bodies, we can 
hardly imagine that these were not created in the beginning 
along with matter. But these facts show ns that they might 
have existed without being visible, or that, after having been 
visible during ages, they might have been absorbed into matter, 
and that it required the power of Almighty God to develop 
them to such an extent as was necessary to the new state 
of the earth ; that is to say, it was rather a recreation than 
an original production of light that is described in the third 
verse." — Geology and Revelation, p. 91. 

This group of errors is a fit associate of Dr. Buck- 
land's. In the first place, not a syllable is uttered by 



108 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

Moses to indicate that siicli an absorption of light 
actually took place, and caused the darkness which 
Dr. H. attempts to explain by it. It is deemed by 
him enough to determine the question at issue, to 
assert that it might have occurred. A very satisfac- 
tory verification truly of the assurance he gives on an 
earlier page, that geology, instead of "a bundle of 
crude speculations and airy hypotheses," is "a col- 
lection of ^ivilung facts ^ with inferences legitimately 
drawn according to the strictest rules of the Baconian 
Philosophy." With what disdain would an attempt 
by a " theologian" to controvert one of his facts or 
inferences by such an expedient be received ! But 
in a geologist, ''according to the strictest rules of 
the Baconian philosophy," it seems to be thought 
enough to invalidate the plainest testimony of the 
Bible, and invest it with a meaning that is at war 
alike with the laws of language and of nature. 

But in the next place, as invisible light and imper- 
ceptible heat would not have exerted the influences 
that are necessary to plants and animals, we are not 
able to see how their existence " without heing visi- 
IW — we were not before aware that heat is visible — 
can furnish any explanation of the life of vegetables 
and animals during the ages in which it is supposed 
they may have been in that latent state. 

Thirdly. We are equally unable to understand 
whg,t is meant by the declaration, that " after having 



RESPECTDTG THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. 109 

been visible during ages, tbey might have been 
absorbed into matter." If the light of those ages 
was visible, it must have been the light of the sun, as 
it is sunlight alone, either direct or reflected, that is 
visible to animals, and ministers to the life of plants. 
Who ever heard that animals see light that is latent ? 
Who ever held that it is latent light, not the light of 
the sun, that is requisite to the growth of vegetables ? 
The light which " modern science" has shown, exists 
" in all bodies," is invisible and latent, not radiated 
into the atmosphere, so as to be the medium of a 
sight of other objects. But if the light which was 
visible during those imagined ages was the light of 
the sun illuminating an atmosphere with its efful- 
gence, as his supposition must imply, what are we to 
understand by the extraordinary representation that 
it '' might have been absorbed into matter .^" Does 
he imagine that matter became inbued with a suscep- 
tibility of absorbing light, so vast as to detach the 
luminiferous atmosphere from the sun, and attract it 
into itself ? If not, if the sun continued to shed forth 
its light with undiminished radiance, as its rays must 
have passed through the atmosphere — if it is held 
that one then existed — in order to reach the matter 
that was to absorb it, how is it that it would not have 
continued to illuminate that atmosphere, and been as 
visible therefore as it is now? Does Dr. H. deem 
himself entitled, in disregard of the laws of light, to 



110 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

assume that it might have lost its susceptibility of 
reflection from the surfaces on which it fell, or that 
"matter" might, in defiance of its established laws, 
have lost its power of reflecting it? What a splendid 
hypothesis for the reconciliation of his theory of an 
anterior existence of the world with the testimony of 
the Creator which it contradicts 1 But Dr. H. cannot, 
on the principles of geology, assume the existence of 
any physical fact that is not referable either to the 
chemical or mechanical forces that are now in acti- 
vity, and acting with their present degree of energy. 
Is he aware, then, of any instances in which those 
forces have actually absorbed the light of the sun, so 
as to involve the world in absolute darkness ? Are 
they now daily producing that stupendous effect? 
If not, his assertion that light, " after having been 
visible during ages, might have been absorbed into 
matter," is as inconsistent with the axioms of geology 
as it is contradictory to the laws of optics. Was ever 
before such a " bundle" of astounding errors couched 
in so narrow a compass, and dignified with the title 
of facts and inferences drawn according to the strict- 
est rules of the Baconian philosophy ? 

But we are not yet at the end of the series. It is 
raised to a towering climax in the representation that 
the light which was created after that absorption, and 
denominated by the Most High day, was the identical 
light which had become latent in matter, and was 



EESPECTING THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. Ill 

developed by him out of the bodies by which it had 
been absorbed. "These facts show" that light and 
heat "might have been absorbed into matter, and 
that it required the power of Almighty God to deve- 
lop them to such an extent as was necessary to the 
new state of the earth." It were in vain to attempt 
to lash such a blunder with the thong of ridicule. It 
transcends the power of satire. Optics, chemistry, 
physics, geology, are alike disregarded. Who ever 
before heard of a day^ commencing with an evening 
and ending with a morning, being produced by a 
development of latent light from the matter of the 
earth's surface? As latent light is only developed 
from the matter in which it is absorbed by a chemi- 
cal process by which that matter is resolved into its 
elements, or united in new combinations, that process 
must have extended over the whole surface of the 
globe. Will Dr. H. be good enough to inform us 
how either the waters of the ocean, or the rocks and 
earths that then formed, as he assumes, the crust of 
the mountains, hills, plains, and valleys, throughout 
the earth, were put into that chemical activity? 
Whence were the exciting forces drawn ? If they 
existed at every point before, why is it that they 
remained inactive till that great crisis ? It will not 
meet the difficulty simply to say, that they were deve- 
loped by an act of Almighty power, or that " it was 
rather a re-creation than an original production of 



112 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

liglit." That is precisely the process of which we wish 
an explanation on the principles of chemistry. What 
is a development of latent light from matter in which 
it has been absorbed, that is. rather a re-creation than 
an original production of it — while, in fact, by the 
terms, it can be neither — and on such a scale as to 
produce day at every point, like that of a brilliant 
sunshine ? Is he aware of the existence in the imme- 
diate vicinity of each of the substances in the crust 
of the earth of elements that are capable of acting on 
them in such a manner ? "Was the globe dropped into 
a vast alembic, filled with powerful chemical agents 
that at once dissolved all the solids and fluids with 
which it came in contact, released their latent light, 
and radiated it into surrounding space ? That would 
have made a. " wreck" of the w^orld undoubtedly^ and 
rendered a new construction and a repopulation of it 
necessary. It is only by some process of that kind 
that such a result could have been produced. What 
an ingenious and philosophic conception to account 
for that illumination of the earth which God called 
Day ! What a profound insight it indicates into the 
mysteries of nature ! At what an infinite distance it 
is removed from " the crude speculations and airy 
hypotheses" in which theologians have indulged! 
And what glory it reflects upon the power of the 
Almighty ! For what a delicate afi^air it must have 
been to form and adjust those forces in such a man- 



RESPECTING THE EXTINCTION OF LIGHT. 113 

ner that they naturallj, through three successive 
revolutions of the earth on its axis, intermitted their 
activity at every line of longitude at the proper mo- 
ment for the commencement of evening, and resumed 
it again at the proper moment for the dawn of morn- 
ing ! 

Such are the singular fancies by which these and 
other writers attempt to reconcile their theory of the 
world with the history which God has given us of its 
creation ; — such the strange absurdities, the infinite 
contradictions to the principles of their own science 
and the universal laws of matter, assent to which is, 
by their own showing, a necessary condition of faith 
in their system I Was such a farce ever before passed 
oif under the dignified and imposing names of " in- 
ductive science" and "Baconian philosophy?" Did 
men of talent and learning ever before confound in so 
extraordinary a manner the principles of their own pro- 
fession ? How is it to be accounted for, except that, 
misled by an excessive enthusiasm, they have mis- 
conceived the proper sphere of geology and the im- 
port of its facts, and assuming it to be a veritable 
science of ascertained and infallible laws peculiar to 
itself, have mistaken their unauthorized inferences 
for demonstrated truths ; and thence, losing in a mea- 
sure their sense of the sanctity of the divine declara- 
tions, and persuaded that their natural cannot be their 
real meaning, have presumed that they may be legi- 



114: DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

timatelj construed on any hypothesis that seems to 
make it possible to suppose them not at war with 
the dogmas of geology. 

So much for the relation of their theory to the 
inspired narrative of the first day's creation. Instead 
of bringing them into harmony, they have only 
shown that they are in the most palpable and irreme- 
diable antagonism. 

We proceed to the history of the second day. 

" And God said, Let there be a firmament in the 
midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from 
the waters. And God made the firmament, and 
divided the waters which were under the firmament, 
from the waters which were above the firmament; 
and it was so. And God called the firmament hea- 
ven : and the evening and the morning were the 
second day," v. 0-8. 

This great act was the creation of the atmosphere. 
The firmament or expanse of the sky is the air. The 
event is described as it would have appeared to a 
spectator near the surface of the earth. As there was 
no atmosphere before, there was iio general illumina- 
tion of the space around the ocean, such as now takes 
place when the sun shines ; but only such ra}'S would 
have entered the eye of a spectator, as descended 
directly from the sun, or were reflected from the 
water, and no points of the surface of the ocean could 
have been visible, except those from which rays were 



KESPECrmG THE ATMOSPHERE. 115 

directly reflected to tlie eye. To one looking on in 
any direction above the water, except immediately 
towards the sun, or a planet or star, the space would 
have appeared dark. The creation of the atmosphere, 
therefore, must have seemed, to a beholder, like the 
extension of a luminous expanse or arch overhead 
which instantly rendered the whole face of the deep, 
within the sphere of the eye, visible. A division of 
the waters followed as a natural consequence. The 
heat of the sun occasioning evaporation in a form 
lighter than the atmosphere, the vapor ascended in an 
invisible shape, probably, till it reached a height at 
which it was condensed, and assumed the form of 
clouds. That it was the atmosphere that was created, 
not a mere elevation of water in the form of mists or 
clouds, is seen also from the fact that God called the 
firmament heaven, which is the name of the upper 
regions of the air in which the clouds float, not of the 
clouds themselves ; that it was the expanse in which 
the sun, moon, and stars seem to be, which is imme- 
diately above the clouds (v. 1-1, 15), and in which the 
fowls fly, which is below them (v. 20) ; and from the 
fact that it remained there permanently, not like the 
vapors and clouds that drift away, or fall in rain, and 
often wholly disappear. The supposition that it was 
anything less than the creation of the atmosphere ; 
that it was a mere conversion of water into mist, and 
elevation of it into space at a distance from the abyss 



116 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

beneatli, divests it of its character as a creative act, 
and reduces it to tlie level of an ordinary operation 
of nature. Besides, if the atmosphere had been crea- 
ted along with the earth and ocean, it would be inex- 
plicable that some evaporation had not immediately 
taken place, and mists and clouds become in a mea- 
sure diffused through the sky. 

This great work was thus one of the most impor- 
tant in the series of creations, and was essential as a 
condition of those that followed. Air is necessary to 
vegetable and animal life, not only on the land, but 
beneath the ocean, which it pervades, and forms, it is 
estimated, one-fortieth part of its bulk. As it is the 
means of the illumination that is diffused by the sun- 
light over the surface of the earth, it is the instrument 
by which objects become visible, and display their 
forms and colors. Without it, even on the supposi- 
tion that it were not necessary to our life, we ^ could 
gain no idea by the eye of the shapes of things, and 
the beautiful hues by which they are adorned. 

How, now, is this creation of the atmosphere on 
the second day to be reconciled with the geological 
theory, which asserts that the earth had existed 
through innumerable ages before, and been the scene 
of animal and vegetable life, and assumes, thereby, 
that it had been invested with an atmosphere ? If 
that theory be true, that atmosphere, like the light 
which illuminated it, must have been annihilated : 



RESPECTING THE ATMOSPHERE. 117 

and geologists, therefore, in order to verify tlieir the- 
ory, must, on their own principles, produce proofs of 
that annihilation, and by the chemical and mechani- 
cal forces which they regard as the only agents that 
produce geological effects. "What, then, are the 
explanations which they present of this stupendous 
catastrophe ? ITot a syllable is uttered by them on 
the subject! Not the slightest indication appears in 
their pages that they are aware that such an obstacle 
exists in the way of their theories ! The supposition 
of a vast interval between the creation of heaven and 
earth announced in the first verse, and the wreck and 
submergence of the world, w^hicli they hold to be 
announced in the second, they regard as all that is 
necessary to the conciliation of their theory with the 
remaining narrative of the creation.* But that is a 

* " There are two methods of conciliation, each of which will obvi- 
ously remove every appearance of discrepance between the record of 
Genesis and our assumed geological periods. We may either, with 
Faber, consider the days as themselves, by a common figure of lan- 
guage, indicating such periods, or we may suppose an interval be- 
tween the first and second verses of that vqcoxA.'' —Christian Obser- 
ver, May, 1831. 

''A very unhappy conflict has been sometimes occasioned by com- 
paring those results of geology which relate to periods left wholly 
undefined in the Scriptural narrative, with the successive works of 
creation which are in that narrative distinctly marked. If we take 
the first verse of Genesis as affirming the eternal superintendence of 
God over all the prior conditions of the world, from the epoch of its 
original creation until he saw fit to give it its present character, and 
to call into being its present races of man, animals, and plants, and 



118 DrFFIOTJLTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

total mistake. They can no more assume the annihi- 
lation of an atmosphere at that imagined wreck of the 
world, without demonstrating its occurrence from the 
present condition of the earth, and by the forces of 
chemistry, lire, and water, than they can assume that 
wreck, and the extinction of light, which they treat 
as contemporaneous with it, without proof, and in 
contravention of the principles of their science. Here 
then is another stupendous postulate on which they 
tacitly proceed, that presents an insuperable obsta- 
cle to the reconciliation of their system with the 
Mosaic record. For how are they to demonstrate that 
such an annihilation of the air, as their scheme im- 
plies, took place, and through the agency of those 

compare this with geological inferences relating to periods anterior 
to man, we shall find two conclusions inevitable : first, that there is 
no word in the Scriptural nai^rative which limits in any way the 
inferences, or even the speculations of geology, with reference to 
these periods ; secondly, that nothing can ever be learned about these 
periods by human labor, except in the way of geological induction. 
This is sulBcient for the purpose of the present inquiry, which relates 
to races of animals and plants, not only anterior to man, but even to 
the elevation of most parts of our continents from beneath the waters 
of the ocean." — Phillips\<i Gzdde to Geol, p. 63. 

*' This alleged disagreement is chiefly chronological. Moses repre- 
sents the work of creation as completed in the space of six days, 
whereas the geologist asserts that the formation of the crust of the 
globe, with its numerous groups of extinct animals and plants, after- 
the original production of the matter of the globe, must have occu- 
pied immense periods of time, whose duration we cannot estimate. 
Other minor discrepances between the two records are supposed to 
exist." — Hitchcock's Geology and Revelation, p. 17. 



RESPECTING THE ATMOSPHERE. 119 

geological forces at the epoch to which they must 
refer it ? The attempt were preposterous. If it had 
taken place, it is not conceivable that any traces of it 
would be found on the strata of the earth. But it is 
demonstrably impossible that it could have been pro- 
duced by the chemical and mechanical agents to 
which they refer the formation of strata. The forces 
of chemistry, fire, and water, have not the slightest 
tendency to absorb, or annihilate the atmosphere. 
Though oxygen and nitrogen are continually absorbed 
by bodies, and disengaged from them in the processes 
that are going forward in the mineral, vegetable, and 
animal worlds, yet there is not the slightest reason to 
su2:>pose that the volume of the atmosphere has under- 
gone the least diminution since the moment of its 
creation. Such is the embarrassing position in which 
they have placed themselves. If they deny that 
there was an atmosphere during the innumerable 
ages which they affirm preceded the Mosaic creation, 
then they virtually deny the existence of plants and 
animals during that period, and overturn their the- 
ory. If they admit that an atmosphere then existed, 
and deny its annihilation anterior to the date of the 
creative act recorded in this passage, they then con- 
tradict the inspired record, and establish the antago- 
nism — which they wish to escape — of their theory 
with the word of God. And if they admit its annihi- 
lation, then they equally contradict and confute them- 



120 " DITFICULTIEd OF GEOLOGISTS 

selves, because of tlie impossibility of their either pro- 
ving or accounting for it on the principles of geology, 
or compatibly with the laws of matter. Their system 
is thus at as open war with the powers of nature as 
it is wdth the teachings of inspiration. E'o skill can 
ever bring it into harmony with either. No learning 
or philosophy can ever demonstrate it, or save it from 
the discredit of the grossest absurdity. Is it not sin- 
gular that these men of science who display such 
admirable powers in the practical branches of their 
profession, should not have extended their inquiries 
fai' enough into this department to discover this fatal 
difficulty? 

QUESTIONS. 

How do geologists meet the contradiction to their own princi- 
ples, and to the sacred text in which they are involved by supposing 
an annihilation of the light and the lands of a former world? Do 
they admit that light must on their theory have existed before the 
creation announced in the text? Did it not become Dr. Buckland, 
who makes that supposition, to offer, if in his power, some proof of 
its reality, and some iniimation of the mode in which it is to be 
reconciled with the principles of geology? Is not his assumption 
wholly unscientific? Is it not absurd to attempt to reconcile the 
theory with the text, by an assumption that not only cannot be 
proved— but that directly contradicts both the sacred record and his 
own principles? Moreover, not having proved an annihilation of 
light, does not his admission that it existed during the life of the 
plants and animals that are buried in the strata, forbid the supposi- 
tion that they existed anterior to the light, the creation of which is 
announced in the text, and thereby overturn the theory that they 



RESPECTING THE ATMOSPHERE. 121 

had their being in a prior age ? By what method hare other writers 
attempted to justify the supposition that a vast period intervened 
between the epochs of the first and the third verses ? What is the 
fii'st objection to that expedient ? What is the second ? What is the 
third ? What does Dr. Buckland suppose was the mode of the extinc- 
tion of light? How does that contradict the statement of the text, 
that light was then created ; not caused by the dispersion of vapors, 
to shine on the earth ? How does it contradict the text in respect to 
the day, which is said to have followed the creation of light ? How 
does it aflfect the meaning of the other acts of creation? If the 
alleged creation of light was no creation, may not the creation of 
vegetables, animals, and man be with equal propriety held to be no 
creations ? But how does Dr. Buckland's supposition consist with 
the fact that there was then no atmosphere by which vapor could 
have been diffused through the space above the earth, so as to inter- 
cept the light ? And how does his supposition consist with the 
fourth geological axiom, which forbids the assumption of any geolo- 
gical events, that cannot be proved to have taken place, and to have 
been produced by the causes to which he refers all geological effects? 
What is Dr. Hitchcock's suggestion respecting the mode in which the 
light may have disappeared ? What is the first objection to that 
hypothesis? What is the next objection to it? What is the third 
objection to it? Is it inconsistent with the laws of light, and of 
matter? Is it inconsistent with the third axiom of geology? Point 
out the absurdities of Dr. Hitchcock's fancy that the light which God 
called day, instead of emanating from -the sun — was developed out 
of the matter of the earth in which it had become absorbed ? Was 
day ever known to be produced in that manner ? Are there any 
known chemical agents capable of developing a day from the mat- 
ter of the earth ? Has Dr. Hitchcock ever got up a day in Massa- 
chusetts by that process ? Is the pretence of reconciling the theory 
with the text by such a supposition, worthy of a man of science, or 
only of an ignorant and presumptuous charlatan ? 
What is the sacred penman's history of the second day's creation ? 

6 



122 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

"What is meant by the firmament ? Did an ascent of vapor, and a 
collection of water in the air in the form of clouds, follow as a 
natural consequence of the creation of the atmosphere ? Was that 
the division of the waters of which the sacred text speaks ? Can the 
geological theory be reconciled with this creation of the atmosphere 
on the second day ? "Why not ? Do geologists evade this difficulty ? 
Are they not bound however, to meet it ? Is it not inconsistent with 
their own principles, as well as unphilosophical, to assume without 
proof, that an atmosphere which they assert had before existed, had 
been annihilated ? Are not the chemical and mechanical forces to 
which they refer all the changes that have taken place on the earth, 
wholly inadequate to produce such an annihilation of the atmos- 
phere ? What is the dilemma then in which they place themselves ? 



liiisrEcrma the dey land, 123 



CHAPTER YI 



Difficulties of geologists in respect to the elevation of Land fi-om the Ocean on the 
Third, and the adjustment of the heavenly Bodies on the Fourth Day of the 
Creation. 



Theie scheme is equally irreconcilable with the 
creative acts of the third day. 

'' And God said, Let the waters under the heaven 
be gathered together into one place, and let the dry 
land appear : and it was so. And God called the 
dry land earth : and the gathering together of the 
waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was 
good. And God said, let the earth bring forth grass, 
and herb yielding seed, and the fruit-tree yielding 
fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the 
earth : and it was so. And the earth brought forth 
grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the 
tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his 
kind : and God saw that it was good. And the even- 
ing and the morning were the third day," v. 9-13. 

As the waters were now first collected into seas, 
and dry land made to appear, it is apparent that the 
ocean had continued up to this time to envelop it at 
every point ; and thence, that it had as yet no moun- 



124: DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

tains, nor even hills, unless of very moderate eleva- 
tion. Its surface beneath the waters formed, proba- 
bly, as even an outline as the ocean itself that reposed 
above it. The change that was wrought, accordingly, 
must have involved an alteration of the crust of the 
earth, either by an elevation of the whole body of the 
continents and islands above the level of the seas, 
and at such unequal heights as to form mountains, 
hills, slopes, and valleys ; or by an elevation of the 
mountains and hills of the dry land, and a depression 
of the seat of the seas ; or both combined. In either 
case, the event, as well as the language of the fiat, 
shows that it was produced by an act of omnipotence, 
and not by second causes. As the dry land immedi- 
ately appeared and became the theatre of vegetable 
life, and in forms, doubtless, adapted to various cli- 
mates, the waters cannot have been withdrawn by 
the mere force of gravity to which they owe their 
movement in streams and rivers. The descent of 
waters over slopes of several thousand miles, like 
those over which the Missouri, Mississippi, Amazon, 
Nile, and Ganges pass, instead of but a small part of 
twenty-four hours, would require several weeks, and 
perhaps months. In like manner the depression of 
the bed of the seas, and elevation of the continents 
and islands, and upheaving of their mountains and 
hills, must have been the work of omnipotence, not 
of mechanical force. Such a stupendous effect, 



RESPECTING THE DRY LAND, 125 

wrought in an instant, or at most in a few hours, is 
infinitely beyond any of the volcanic powers, so far 
as we are able to estimate their energy, that have 
ever agitated the earth's surface. To attempt to 
explain it by the laws of matter, as far as we have a 
knowledge of them, is scarcely less unphilosophic 
than it were to ascribe to them the creation of the 
world. It was the fiat of the Almighty that wrought 
the change. "By the word of the Lord were the 
heavens made ; and all the host of them by the 
breath of his mouth. He gathereth the waters of the 
sea togethei- as an heap ; he layeth up the depth in 
store-houses. Let all the earth fear the Lord ; let all 
the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him : for 
he spake and it was; he commanded, and it stood 
fast," Ps. xxxiii. 6-9. 

As the earth was immediately fit for the support 
of vegetables and trees of all kinds, it is apparent 
that it was covered with a soil consisting of silica, 
alumine, lime, and other ingredients, which now 
enter into the composition of vegetables, and mixed 
in different places in the different proportions that 
are congenial to the several species of herbs and 
trees. What the extent was of the continents and 
islands we have no means of determining. They 
bore possibly a very different proportion to the seas, 
from that which subsists between the present lands 
and the waters of the globe. 



126 DIFriCULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

The geological theory, which asserts the existence 
of the world through innumerable ages anterior to 
this epoch, is thus again in conflict with the sacred 
word ; for that theory not only refers the upheaving 
of the mountains and elevation of the hills, as well as 
the formation of the strata in which the fossil relics 
of plants and animals are imbedded, to that distant 
age, but exhibits those strata themselves as formed 
mainly from the detritus of a preceding system of 
mountains and continents. Thus Dr. Macculloch 
says : — 

"It is important to observe the exact resemblance 
between the present primary rocks and the still more ancient 
ones from the ruins of which they have been partly at least 
formed. 

" Now, as the compounded rocks now forming are pro- 
duced by the consolidation of materials carried//'07» tht land 
into the sea, it follows that before the formation of the pre- 
sent primary strata, and while they were all buried beneath 
the water in their germs, ihere was a terraqibeous globe, an 
earth containing land and water, mountains, rivers, and seas. 
That earth, also, was formed of rodcs similar to those of the- 
present prirnary strata ; and further, it is important to ob- 
serve, of granite also, proving that this agent had then, as 
in later times, heen the cause of the elevation of the strata.^^ — 
Geology, vol. i. p. 464. 

" The detritus of iha first drylands being drifted into the 
sea, and then spread out into extensive beds of mud, and 



KESPECTESTG- THE DKY LAET>. 127 

sand, and gravel, would have for ever remained beneath the 
surface of the water, had not other forces been subsequently 
employed to raise them into dry land ; these forces appear 
to have been the same expansive powers of heat and vapor 
which, having caused the elevation of the first raised portions 
of fundamental crystalline rocks, continued their energies 
through all succeeding geological periods, and still exert 
them in producing the phenomena of active volcanoes." — 
Buckland's Bridg. Tr., pp. 42, 43. 

^' One of the most interesting of the results to which the 
careful study of the elevation of mountains has conducted 
geologists, and at the same time one of the most certain, is 
the knowledge that the dry land is not all of the same anti- 
quity ; in other words, that some mountain ranges and some 
large regions were raised above the sea long before the 
occurrence of the convulsions which affected the level of 
other countries, and even before thz 'production of the strata 
of tJiese countries. For instance, we have no doubt that the 
Grampian, Lammermuir, and Cumberland mountains were 
«dry long before the Alps were raised from the sea, and while 
the greater part of Europe was occupied by the ancient 
ocean," — Phillips's Guide, p. 46. 

As he holds not only that the lower strata of all 
countries, but that those which he regards as formed 
since the elevation of the Grampian and Cumberland 
mountains, were deposited innumerable ages ago ; he 
holds that those mountains, also, have existed through 
an incalculable period. This view is entertained also 
by Sir C. Lyell, who regards Etna as having existed 



128 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

through an immense series of ages anterior to the his- 
torical era; although, compared with the primary 
strata, he holds that it is of yery modern date. 

" There are no records within the historical era, which 
lead to the opinion that the altitude of Etna has materially 
varied within the last two thousand years. Of the eighty 
most conspicuous minor cones which adorn its flanks, only 
one of the largest has been produced within the times of 
authentic history. . . . The dimensions of these large, cones 
appear to bear testimony to paroxysms of volcanic activity, 
after which we may conclude, from analogy, that the fires 
of Etna remained dormant for many years — since nearly a 
century of rest has sometimes followed a violent eruption in 
the historical era. . . . 

" How many years, then, must we not suppose to have 
been expended in the formation of the eighty cones ? It is 
difficult to imagine that a fourth part of them have origina- 
ted during ike last thirty centuries. But if we conjecture the 
whole of them to have been formed in twelve thousand years, 
how inconsiderable an era vjould this jportion of time constitute 
in the history of this volcano ! If we could strip off from 
Etna all the lateral monticules now visible, together with 
the scorise that have been poured out from them, and from 
the highest crater, during the period of their growth, the 
diminution of the mass would be extremely slight ; Etna 
might lose, perhaps, several miles in diameter at its base, 
and some hundreds of feet in elevation ; but it would still 
be the loftiest of Sicilian mountains. . . . 

" On the grounds, therefore, already explained, we must 



EESPECTING THE DKY LAND. 129 

infer that a mass so many thousand feet in thickness must 
have required an immense series of ages anterior to its histori- 
cal ^periods for its growth ; yet the whole must he regarded as 
the ^product of a modern portion of the tertiary ejpochP — LyeWs 
Frincij^les, pp. 404, 405. 

These writers thus not only assert the existence of 
continents and mountains countless years anterior to 
the date of the creation recorded in Genesis, but they 
refer the present mountains of the earth, both such as 
are volcanic and those that consist mainly of granite, 
to that distant period. Their theory is, accordingly, 
in open antagonism to the inspired history of the third 
day's creation ; and the contradiction which it offers 
to it is not slight, but as vast as the mountains them- 
selves are that rear their rocky masses into the hea- 
vens, and the plains and vales that slope from their 
sides to the ocean. If their views are correct, the 
Mosaic record which exhibits the earth as submerged 
beneath the ocean till the morning of the third day, 
and its first dry land as then produced by the remo- 
val of the waters into seas, cannot be. 'No more pal- 
pable and irreconcilable contradiction between two 
statements can be conceived. 

How now do the geological and theological writers 
who maintain the consistency of their theory with the 
account God has here given of the creation of the 
world, extricate themselves from this difiiculty ? Not 



130 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

a solitary allusion is made by them to it, so far as we 
are aware ! They seem to have assumed, as in res- 
pect to the creation of the atmosphere, that if allowed 
to intercalate a vast tract of ages between the epoch 
of the first and of the second verses, their harmony 
with the narrative that follows is of course estab- 
lished. "What a beautiful verification, again, of the 
claim which some of them put forth to an exclusive 
right and competence to treat of the subject ! A 
more unfortunate position than that which they 
occupy cannot well be imagined. Let them interpose 
as many ages as they please betwixt the periods of 
the first and second verses, and it can contribute 
nothing towards reconciling their theory with the fact 
made known to us in this passage, that at the com- 
mencement of the third day there were no mountains 
or hills on the face of the earth, nor lands of any des- 
cription above the level of the ocean. If all the 
mountains, hills, and dry lands of the present conti- , 
nents and islands were formed either then or since 
that epoch, as the record God has given of their 
origin testifies, then indisputably they cannot have 
been formed in the remote and indeterminable ages 
to which geologists refer them. It cannot be pre- 
tended that, after having existed through the vast 
periods ascribed to them, they were at the Mosaic 
epoch depressed beneath the ocean,, and raised again 
to their former position on the third day. 'No Intel- 



ItESPECTING TUK DRY LAND. 131 

ligent geologist will venture on a supposition so 
wholly irreconcilable with the nature of the primi- 
tive masses of which the mountains consist, and the 
condition of the strata that are superposed on them. 
Such a movement would have dislocated and broken 
to fragments those of the latter, which now, although 
bent and contorted in many forms, are continuous, 
and conform in their curves to the outline of the pri- 
mitive rocks on which they repose. The whole con- 
dition both of those primitive masses and the strata 
which they uphold, forbids the idea that they have 
undergone more than one elevation above the lands 
by w^hich they are surrounded. 

Here, then, we have again the most unanswerable 
proofs, and on the vastest scale, of the irreconcilable- 
ness of the geological theory and the history in 
Genesis of the creation of the world. 'No chemistry 
or mechanics can save the system from this dilemma. 
It were discreditable to attempt to reconcile repre- 
sentations so diametrically the opposites of each other. 
The supposition that the mountains of the earth were 
formed in the fabulous ages to which geologists refer 
them, must be renounced, or the inspiration and truth 
of the record God has given us of the origin of the 
world must be rejected. 

Their theory is irreconcilable, also, with the crea- 
tive acts of the fourth day. 

" And God said, let there be lights in the firma- 



132 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOaiSTS 

ment of the heaven, to divide the day from the night ; 
and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for 
days, and for years. And let them be for lights in the 
firmament of the heaven to give light npon the 
earth: and it was so. And God made two great 
lights ; the greater light to rule the day, and the 
lesser light to rule the night; the stars also. And 
God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give 
light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and 
over the night, and to divide the light from the dark- 
ness : And God saw that it was good. And the even- 
ing and the morning were the fourth day," v. 14:- 
19. 

Writers on geology differ in their views of the 
import of this act. Some suppose that the light 
created on the first day, was either the ether, which is 
by many thought to be the medium of its perceptibi- 
lity, or light that exists or is made perceptible inde- 
pendently of the sun, like that which is sometimes 
evolved from bodies by chemical action that pro 
duces combustion; and that the creative act hen'^e 
recorded was the investiture of the sun with its light- 
giving atmosphere. But that is inconsistent with the 
characteristics and offices of the light created on the 
first day. As that light constituted morning, and 
was followed by evening; as there was a division 
instituted between it and the night, that was the same 
as now subsists between day and night ; and as the 



RESPECTING THE SUN, MOON, AND STARS. 133 

illumination wliich it caused was called day, and 
with the night that preceded it, occupied the period 
of a revolution of the earth on its axis, it is plain that 
it must have been the light that now constitutes day, 
and the light therefore of the sun. 

Others suppose the eflect of the divine fiat was 
merely the dispersion of vapors or clouds that had 
accumulated in the atmosphere, and obscured or hid- 
den the sun. But that implies that the office to which 
the sun, moon, and stars were assigned, was to be 
exercised only in fair weather ; as otherwise they must 
have- filled it as fully before the fiat, as they could 
afterwards, when they were hidden by clouds. It is 
irreconcilable, also, with the representation that they 
were set for signs, and for seasons, and for days and 
for years ; not for the mere periods in which they 
might happen to shine on the earth without obstruc- 
tion. It was a great and permanent change that was 
wrought, not merely a purification of the atmosphere 
from exhalations that might have arisen from natural 
causes, and been immediately followed by fresh mists 
and clouds. 

Others regard the fiat of the Creator as merely an- 
nunciatory of the office which the heavenly orbs were 
to fill towards the earth ; not as causing a change of 
their relations to one another, or to the earth, or of 
the earth's relations to them. 

That is equally inconsistent with the passage, which 



134 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

exhibits the act of the Most High as creative, and as 
constituting the sun, moon, and stars, what they had 
not before been, the determiners to the earth of sea- 
sons, and days, and years. K it were not an omni- 
potent act accomplishing an important step in the 
completion of the system, then the work of the crea- 
tion, instead of occupying six days, must have been 
confined to five. 

The act, then, was almighty and creative ; it was 
exerted, apparently at least, on the bodies of the solar 
system already in existence, and really so, or else on 
the earth, and perhaps on both, and its effect was an 
alteration of their relations or motions by which the 
sun, moon, and stars became the determiners to the 
earth of its seasons, days, and j^ears. The plain sense 
of the fiat is, " Let the luminaries in the firmament 
of the heaven be to divide the day from the night ; 
and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for 
days, and for years." A change, therefore, was 
wrought in their adjustment and motions, which gave 
birth to seasons, and years, and the variations in the 
length of days. That may have been simply the 
inclination of the earth's axis — and the axes of the 
other planets, for the fiat may be considered as afi'ect- 
ing them all — to the ecliptic, which is the reason that 
there is a diversity and succession of the seasons, that 
there is a variation in the length of the days and 
nights, and that the circle of changes through which 



RESPECTING THE STJN, MOON, AJ^D STARS. 135 

thej pass is completed in tlie compass of a year, and 
repeated in every answering period. If the earth's 
axis had previously been perpendicular to the ecliptic, 
and had continued so, there could have been no vari- 
ation in the length of the days, no diversity and suc- 
cession of seasons, and no obvious signs of the com- 
pletion of the year. The last is now known, from the 
declination of the sun, and the consequent variation 
of the length of the days and nights, and succession 
of the seasons. It could then have been known only 
by observing the relation of the earth to the constel- 
lations of the zodiac. Such a change extended to the 
whole circle of the planets, all of which are inclined 
to the ecliptic — perhaps to the infinite crowd of simi- 
lar orbs that are supposed to circle round the other 
suns of our star-system — and giving rise to such a 
train of important events in the economy of life, was 
w^orthy of the omnipotent fiat, and one of the subli- 
mest of the creative acts. 

It is possible, however, that it may have been of a 
still grander character. It may, besides that change, 
have embraced the communication to the earth and 
other planets of the projectile motion by which they 
are borne roimd in their orbits. It is conceivable 
that at their creation they received no other motion 
than that by wdiich they revolve on their axes. 
Neither that nor their projectile motion is, like the 
force of gravity, inherent, but adventitious, and must 



136 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

be referred to an omnipotent fiat. As, however, they 
were subject to the gravitating power from the mo- 
ment of their creation, the supposition that the force 
which drives them around their orbits was not im- 
parted to them till the fourth daj, implies that at 
their creation they were at a far greater distance both 
from the sun and from each other. The space which 
belongs to our system is, however, amply sufficient 
for the arrangement that would then have been 
required. Astronomers have estimated that the 
planet nearest the sun, if divested of its projectile 
force, and the centrifugal force also generated by its 
revolution on its axis, would not fall to the sun in less 
than fifteen days and a half ; nor the moon to the 
the earth in less than about five days.^ 

It would be no difficult problem to determine what 
their respective distances from the sun must have 
been, that, falling under the force of gravity, they 
should at the end of 72 hours have reached the dis- 
tances at which they are now stationed, when they 
received the projectile impulse that sends them 
around their orbits. The supposition implies, indeed. 



Mercury would fall to the 


sun 


in . 


15 days 13 hours. 


Yenus 


u 


« 




39 " 


17 " 


The Earth " 


ii 


(( 




. 64 " 


10 " 


Mars 


u 


(t 




. 121 « 


" 


Jupiter 


'•' 


u 




290 " 


" 


Satura 


<; 


l( 




798 " 


" 


Georgium Sidus 


a 


(I 




5,406 " 


« 


The Moon would fall to the Earth in 


4 " 


21 " 



RESPECTING THE SUN, MOON, AND STARS. 137 

that the momentum tliey had acquired was annihi- 
lated at those points, and may be thought to he 
improbable. Why should it be deemed more singu- 
lar, however, than that the sun was created without 
the robe by which it fills its office as the luminary of 
its circle of revolving orbs? or that the earth was 
formed at first without mountains, hills, or dry land ? 
As it would have given birth to a variation in the 
length of the days and nights and a succession of 
seasons and years, and meets, therefore, the condi- 
tions of the passage in even a more emphatic manner 
than the former, it may at least be considered as pos- 
sibly the act God then exerted ; and, if extended to 
all the planetary systems that revolve round the 
countless stars of our galaxy, was one of the vastest 
and most momentous of the whole series of the crea- 
tive fiats. 

Whichever of these is supposed to be the work of 
the fourth day — and one or the other undoubtedly 
must, as there is no other by which the sun, moon, 
and stars could be made to determine as they do, the 
length of the days, and the succession of seasons and 
years— it is, like the others, wholly irreconcilable with 
the geological theory. If the earth had already 
existed through an incalculable round of ages, and 
been the scene of vegetable and animal life, it must 
have revolved round the sun, and that orb and the 
moon and stars filled the office they now do, as deter- 



138 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

miners of the length of the days and nights, and the 
succession of seasons and years. It will be said, per-* 
haps, that if the axis of the earth be supposed to have 
been perpendicular to the ecliptic during those ages, 
and to have received its present inclination on the 
fourth day of the creation, recorded by Moses, it will 
meet all the conditions of the text. That supposition, 
however, cannot be made by geologists ; as their max- 
ims forbid their assuming the occurrence of any 
event which is not demonstrated by the present con- 
dition of the earth, and was not caused by the forces 
to w^hich they refer the facts of geology. But no 
traces exist in the crust of the globe, of such a change 
in the relation of the earth's axis to the ecliptic. It 
lias been supposed, indeed, to have taken place at the 
deluge, and to have been the occasion of that catas- 
trophe ; but geologists treat it as w^holly improbable. 
Some of them deny even that there are any evidences 
in the condition of the earth of the occurrence of the 
deluge itself. "While many of them regard the fossil 
vegetables, and animals that are found in high lati- 
tudes, as decisive proofs that the temperature of those 
climes during their life must have been far higher 
than at present, they generally ascribe the superior 
warmth which is supposed then to have prevailed, to 
the influence of internal fires. They cannot, there- 
fore, assume that the earth's axis received at the 
Mosaic epoch its present inclination, unless they pre- 



KESPECXrNG- THE SUXj MOODS', AND STAKS. 139 

vionsly assume that immediately before the six clays' 
creation, when, according to them, the workl was 
made a " wreck," it was raised from its inclination to 
a right angle to the ecliptic. But that were in contra- 
vention of their principles, both because there are no 
proofs in the present condition of the earth of such a 
change ; and because, if it took place, it cannot have 
been caused by the chemical and mechanical forces 
to which alone they can refer such a change in the 
position of the globe. It were supremely absurd to 
suppose that chemistryj any volcanic action, or any 
movement of the ocean, can have thrown the axis of 
the earth from an angle, to a perpendicular to the 
ecliptic. In maintaining, therefore, that the earth 
had revolved round the sun through an immeasurable 
tract of years, with its present inclination to the eclip- 
tic and diversity of days and seasons, they in effect 
assume either that at the close of that period it was 
made a " wreck," and lost its inclination to the eclip- 
tic, or else that no such change was wrought in its 
condition on the fourth day of the Mosaic creation, 
as is related in this passage. If the latter, they offer 
a direct contradiction to the inspired record ; if the 
former, they both contradict the announcement in 
the first four verses, and in Exodus xx. 3, that the 
earth itself, and the sun, moon, and stars, were crea- 
ted on the first of the six days ; and contravene their 
own principles, which forbid them to assume the 



140 DIFFICrLTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

occurrence of any change of the earth's condition 
that was not produced by the chemical and mechan- 
ical agents to which they refer all geological elFects. 
Of this difficulty, as they appear not to have been 
aware of its existence, they have not attempted a 
solution. 

QUESTIONS. 

Could there have been any mountains or high hills on the earth's 
surface while it continued to be covered by the ocean ? What must 
have been the process by which the dry land was formed ? Must the 
change have been rapid, if large continents and islands immediately 
became dry ? Must the dry land have been covered with a soil fit 
for the support of vegetables ? Is this narrative of the formation of 
mountains on the third day, reconcilable with the geological theory ? 
To what epoch do geologists refer the elevation of the mountains ? 
Do they hold that the soil of the present strata formed the surface of 
the earth which was elevated from the waters at this epoch ; and that 
the materials of these strata were drawn from mountains and lands 
that had previously existed? State the opinions of Macculloch, 
Buckland, Phillips, and Lyell. Are not these opinions in the most 
open antagonism to the sacred text ? To what expedient do geolo- 
gists resort to extricate themselves from this difficulty? Is their 
omission to notice it adapted to confirm the claim they often pat 
forth, to an exclusive competence to treat of the subject? Does the 
supposition on which they rely to save themselves from all difficul- 
ties — that a vast tract of ages intervened between the epoch of the 
first and second verses — relieve them in any measure from this con- 
tradiction to the sacred text? If continents and mountains had 
existed for ages before the era of the third day's creation, must not 
those mountains and continents have been got rid of and the earth 
reduced to a geological level, in order that a new set could be pro- 



RESPECTING THE SrX, MOOX, AND STAKS. 141 

duced at the time and in the maimer the text narrates ? Can a more 
irreconcilable contradiction be conceived, than their theory thus 
forms to the inspired history ? 

What was the act of the fourth day's creation ? What is the first 
of the views geologists entertain of this creative act ? What is the 
objection to that view ? What is the second construction they place 
on this act ? What is the objection to that view of it? What is the 
third notion they entertain of it ? Is that consistent with the lan- 
guage of the passage ? What then was the true import of the crea- 
tive fiat ? What was the effect wrought by it ? How may a change 
have been produced in the relations of the earth and other planets 
and the sun, that gave birth to seasons and years ? What other 
change in their relations to each other may also have taken place ? 
Is either of these effects reconcilable with the geological theory ? 
Show how it is irreconcilable with the supposition that a change of 
the distances of the planets from each other and from the sun was 
wrought by the creative act. Show how it is inconsistent with the 
supposition that the effect wrought was the change of the earth's axis 
from a perpendicular to its present inclination to the ecliptic. 



142 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 



CHAPTEK YII . 

Difficulties of Geologists respecting the Creation of Animals and Man. 

Theik theory tliat tlie plants and animals wliose 
relics are buried in the earth, had their life during 
the ages which they hold preceded ihe " wreck" and 
reconstruction of the globe six thousand years ago, is 
in like manner contradictory to the inspired history 
of the creative acts of tlie third, fifth, and sixth days. 

"And God said. Let the waters bring forth abun- 
dantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl 
that may fly above the earth in the open firmament 
of heaven. And God created great whales, and 
every living creature that moveth, which the waters 
brought forth abundantly after their kind, and every 
winged fowl after his kind. And God saw that it 
was good. And God blessed them, saying : Be fruit- 
ful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and 
let fowl multiply in the earth. And the evening and 
the morning were the fifth day. ' 

" And God said, Let the earth bring forth the liv- 
ing creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, 



IN RESPECT TO THE CKEATION OF ANIMALS. 143 

and beast of the earth after his kind : And it was so. 
And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, 
and cattle after their kind, and every thing that 
creepeth npon the earth after his kind. And God 
saw that it was good. 

" And God said. Let ns make man, in our image, 
after om' likeness, and let them have dominion over 
the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and 
over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over 
every creeping thing that creepeth npon the earth. 
So God created man in his own image ; in the image 
of God created he him ; male and female created he 
them. And God blessed them. And God said unto 
them: Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the 
earth, and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish 
of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over 
every living thing that moveth upon the earth. And 
God said : Behold, I have given you every herb bear- 
ing seed, which is npon the face of all the earth, 
and every tree in which is the fruit of a tree yielding 
seed ; to you it shall be for meat. And to every 
beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and 
to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein 
there is life, I have given every green herb for meat : 
and it was so. And God saw every thing that he had 
made, and behold, it was very good. And the eve- 
ning and the morning were the sixth day." — Chap. i. 
20-31. 



144: DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

"Thus the heavens and the earth were finished^ and 
all the host of them. And on the seventh day God 
ended his work which he had made. And he rested 
on the seventh day from all his work which he had 
made. And God blessed the seventh day and sancti- 
fied it ; because that in it he had rested from all his 
work, which God created and made. 

" These are the generations of the heavens and of 
the earth when they were created, in the day that the 
Lord God made the earth and the heavens, and every 
plant and every herb of the field before it grew : for 
the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the 
earth ; and there was not a man to till the ground. 
But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered 
the whole face of the ground." — Chap. ii. 1-6. 

The theory of a previous existence through innu- 
merable ages of the heavens and earth, and the veget- 
ables and animals that are buried in its strata, is thus 
in as marked antagonism with this part of the history 
as with the other. We are expressly told that these 
are the generations ; that is, the origins, or modes of 
the first existence of the heavens and the earth when 
they were created ; and that it was thus^ that is in the 
manner related, that " the heavens and the earth were 
finished^ and all the host of them." J^o language 
could more specifically declare that they were all 
called into being during the six days, or more nffectu- 
ally preclude the supposition of their previous exist- 



IN RESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 145 

eiice. It is as unwarrantable a contradiction of the 
narrative to assert tliat plants and animals, the earth 
itself, and heavens, existed through countless ages 
before, as it were to assert that man lived through 
those ages. But geologists admit that man had no 
existence anterior to the date here assigned to his 
creation. Why then should they deny that the nar- 
rative exhibits the plants and animals also, and the 
earth itself as then first created ? They unquestiona- 
bly cannot, if governed in their views by the lan- 
guage of the history ; and the fact, therefore, that 
they assert their previous existence, shows that the 
inspired record of the epoch and method of the crea- 
tion not only is not the guide of their faith, but is not in 
reality of any authority with them in the determination 
of their system. It is accordingly admitted by some 
among them that this revealed history must be modi- 
fied and forced to a metaphorical, or perhaps a mythi- 
cal meaning, in order to remove its contradictions to 
their theory. It is directly claimed, indeed, that it is 
to be construed by that theory instead of its own lan- 
guage, in order to render its inspiration credible. 
While it is held to be true, its truth is equally held 
to depend on its being susceptible of a construction 
that admits the supposition of a previous existence of 
the earth and its vegetable and animal races through 
an incalculable series of ages. Thus Dr. Buck- 
land : 



146 DIFFICL'LTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

" If the suggestioDs I shall venture to propose, require 
some modification of the most commonly received and popular 
interpretation of the Mosaic narrative, this admission neither 
inTolves any impeachment of the authenticity of the text, 
nor of the judgment of those who have formerly interpreted it 
otherwise, in the absence of information as to facts which 
have but recently been brought to light ; and if in this 
respect geology should seem to require some little conces- 
sion from the literal interpretation of Scripture, it may 
fairly be held to afford ample compensation for this demand, 
by the large additions it has made to the evidences of 
natural religion, in a department where revelation was not 
designed to give information." — Bridg. Treat, p. 14. 

It is thus imhesitatinglj admitted that in order to 
exempt it from collision with the theory, the inter- 
pretation of the inspired record must be modified, 
and a meaning assigned it which, before the geolo- 
gical facts that have recently been brought to light 
were known, could not have been deduced by the 
laws of philology.'^ 

* That Dr. Buckland penned the passage, however, with but a 
very inadequate consideration of its import, is apparent from the 
fancy he advances that such a violation of the narrative could be 
compensated by an addition to the evidences of natural religion. 
That an admission that that part of revelation, on the truth of which 
the veracity of all the rest depends, is shown by geology to be so 
false, as to make it necessary to put on it a forced and unphilolo- 
gical construction, can be counterbalanced by an addition to the 
evidences of theism, is truly a very extraordinary solecism, alike iu 
hermeneutics and theology. 



IN KESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 14:7 

Dr. Hitchcock also asserts the necessity of con- 
struing the narrative by the facts of geology, in con- 
travention of the laws of language. 

" Moses represents the work of creation as completed in 
the space of six days ; whereas the geologist asserts that 
the formation of the crust of the globe, with its numerous 
groups of extinct animals and plants, after the orighial pro- 
duction of the matter of the globe, must have occupied 
immense periods of time, whose duration we cannot esti- 
mate. 

" We must decide whether geological facts can ever be 
permitted, as facts derived from civil history and astronomy 
are, to modify our interpretation of the sacred record. The 
Scriptures speak of the rising and setting of the sun ; but 
astronomy shows us that they employ such language in 
accordance with optical, not physical truth. And the 
cases are too common to need particularizing, where the 
interpretation is essentially modijBed by civil history. Why 
should there be any question, then, whether geological facts 
ought to have the same influence in exposition ? For so 
far as it bears on revelation, geology is nothing but a his- 
tory of the globe anterior, for the most part, to the com- 
mencement of civil history. The only reason that has ever 
been alleged for refusing to use geological facts in this way, 
is that they are too uncertain. But although true half a 
century ago, the fundamental facts of this science may now 
be regarded as resting on as firm a foundation, and to be as 
well understood, as those of any science not strictly demon- 



148 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

strative. The principles of sounci criticism, therefore; 
demand that they should be admitted equally with civil 
history and astronomy, as aids in the interpretation of the 
Bible." — Geology and Revelation, pp. It, 23, 24. 

The construction of the text, tlierefore, is not only 
to be modified by tlie facts of geology, but by his own 
concession completely reversed. ]^o greater oppo- 
sites can be conceived, than two representations of 
the creation, one of which assigns it to a date so 
distant that immense periods followed whose duration 
cannot be estimated, and the other fixes its epoch at 
about six thousand years ago, and exhibits it as 
accomplished in the space of six days. And what a 
singular tissue of errors and fallacies are employed to 
verify this assumption ! In the first place, astronomy 
does not create any necessity of altering the interpre- 
tation of passages in which the sun is said to rise and 
set. IsTo translator of the Bible rejects that form of 
representation, and substitutes the language in which 
it would be astronomically expressed. Such a change 
would be wholly unwarrantable. That description 
is as true to the senses, as the other is to the scientific 
intellect. It is not inaccurate, therefore, but expresses 
in that relation a genuine fact. There are many 
other forms of expression in which events are 
described in the same way, and with perfect truth. 
Thus, to say that one man sees another, expresses an 



IN RESPECT TO THE C]IEATI02> OF ANIMALS. 149 

absolute fact to the senses, altliougli in reality lie only 
sees by an image produced by rays of light at the 
bottom of the eye. In like manner, to say that one 
man hears another's voice expresses a fact to the 
senses, although, according to acoustics, he only per- 
ceives a vibration of the tympana of his own ears. 
Does Dr. H. consider it an inaccuracy to ascribe to 
objects colors, odors, tastes, and other qualities, which 
are mere effects, or forms of sensation ? Is it not a 
fact to the senses, that snow and wool are white ; that 
grass and the foliage of trees are green, and that the 
rainbow has the hues of the prism ? Is it an inaccu- 
racy to speak of seeing, and smelling, and painting a 
flower ? This and all similar language of the senses 
is used on precisely the same principle as that which 
he quotes respecting the sun, and is employed as 
universally in conversation and every species of com- 
position, scientific as well as that which relates to the 
ordinary affairs of life, as it is in the sacred writings. 
Every single fact^ indeed^ throughout the domain of 
geology^ and every one of its theoretical doctrines^ is 
expressed in this language. Is it not, then, to be 
interpreted as denoting identically what the facts 
which it expresses are to the senses? To deny it 
were at one blow to subvert the whole fabric of the 
science ! For what are the facts of geology if they 
are not wliat they are to the senses ? Tliey have 
never been exhibited as anything else by any of those 



150 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

who have hitherto treated of them. But if this 
language is to be taken as denoting what the things 
which it expresses are to the senses, then how is its 
use in the instance he alleges to aid him in his argu- 
ment ? Does he regard the mode in which the Scrip- 
tures speak in respect to the sun, as parallel to the 
mode in which they exhibit the work of creation ? 
Does he hold that that representation, of the creation 
is to the facts of geology, optically considered, what 
the language of the Eible in respect to the motions 
of the sun is to the facts as they are to the senses ? 
That were again to demolish his whole theory ; for if 
the facts of geology are to the eye, in harmony with 
the account the Bible gives of the creation, then they 
present no visible indications of the earth's existence 
through an immeasurable period anterior to the epoch 
of that creation, but confirm the sacred narrative. 
If, however, there is no parallel between them, why 
does he quote that usage in respect to the creation ? 
But he does not regard them as parallels. Instead, 
he holds that the facts of geology, optically con- 
sidered, are irreconcilable witli the representation of 
the sacred history, and the aim of the new element 
which he wishes to introduce into hermeneutics is, not 
to reconcile those facts to the inspired record by 
showing that they are what that record represents — 
not what they optically seem to be ; but, instead, to 
show that that history does not teach what it literally 



IN KESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 151 

means, "but on the contrary, wlaat the facts of geology 
optically indicate! The case which he alleges to 
illustrate what he wishes to accomplish, in place of 
presenting a resemblance, is thus a direct converse 
of it.* 

He is equally unfortunate in the statement that 
" the cases are too common to need particularizing 
where the interpretation is essentially modified by 
civil history." Let him produce an example, if in his 
power. He may find instances in which, in one pas- 
sage, a fact is related that is not mentioned in another 
that treats of the same subject ; but none in which a 
fact is mentioned that renders it necessary to depart 
from the laws of philology in interpreting another. 

But the great fallacy of his remarks lies in the 
representation that the facts of geology contradict tho 
Mosaic record of the creation, and make it necessary 
to modify the interpretation of that record in order to 
bring them into harmony with each other. It is his 
construction of those facts, or inferences from them, 
not the facts themselves, that contravene the inspired 

* The logic of his argument, seems, therefore, to be the following : 
— Inasmuch as the language of the Scriptures, of science, and of 
common life, used to express facts as they are to the senses, is not in 
accordance with the truth, philosophically considered ; therefore, the 
record inscribed on the strata of the earth, as it appears to the senses 
of geologists, is to be considered as in harmony with the philoso- 
phical and absolute truth! This is no "airy hypothesis,'" it seems, 
but a "striking fact," and an "inference drawn according to the 
strictest rules of the Baconian philosophy." 



152 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

account of the creation — things as distinct and as un- 
like as a false conclusion is from the premise from 
which it is drawn ; as a creature's error is from the 
truth of God. 

Geologists themselves, however, instead of adhering 
to this rule of interpretation, and applying it to the 
record, dismiss it on reaching the narrative of the 
creation of man, and assume that he was in fact first 
called into being at the epoch which that represents ; 
and they accordingly allege the fact that no human 
bones are found fossilized in the lower or intermedi- 
ate strata, as a proof that he did not exist till ages 
after the creation of vegetables and animals. But 
that is to desert their own principles. If they are j.us- 
tified in the construction they put on the history till 
they reach the narrative of his creation, they must, to 
be consistent, carry it through ; and conclude, there- 
fore, that the circumstance that no human skeletons 
have hitherto been discovered in the strata in which 
vegetables and animals are found, is no proof that they 
are not in fact imbedded in them, and will not be dis- 
covered in great numbers, when more extensive exa- 
minations are made. And should such discoveries be 
made, they will be compelled by their law of inter- 
pretation, not to relinquish their theory, but to apply 
it, in the light of that new fact of geology, to the his- 
tory of the creation of man, and assume and assert 
his existence as well as that of vegetables and ani- 



m RESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIAIALS. 153 

mals, tlirougli the immeasurable periods, whose dura- 
tion we canhot estimate, anterior to the six days' crea- 
tion. A single human skeleton, or fragment of one, 
found in the depths of the earth, amidst the relics of 
plants, fish, and land animals, which they refer to 
those fabulous periods, must drive them, by a logical 
necessity, to an instant rejection of the truth and in- 
spiration of the whole of the history God has given 
us of the creation ! Can a more decisive proof be 
asked of the total error of that system ? According 
to them, the credibility of Genesis i. and ii., and 
thence of the rest of the Pentateuch, and consequently 
of all the other parts of the Old, and the whole of the 
JSTew Testament, depends on the mere possibility that 
no fossil human bones are buried in the fossiliferous 
strata ; — a possibility that not only cannot be proved, 
but that may be confuted any hour. A blow like 
this at the Christian system will hardly be regarded 
by prudent men as having an ample compensation 
"in the large addition" geology "has made to the 
evidences of natural religion." 

In the next place, their theory of the existence of 
the earth with its fossil plants and animals through 
those imagined ages, is forbidden by their own prin- 
ciple, as well as by the divine w^ord. In order to 
reconcile the creation of plants and animals recorded 
in Genesis with their theory, they suppose the races 
to which those buried in the strata belonged, to have 

7* 



154: DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

been exterminated at the " wreck " of tlie world, 
which thej regard as having immediately preceded 
the six days' creation. According to the axioms, 
however, by which they profess to be governed, they 
cannot assume such a stupendous occurrence and 
make it the basis of their theory, unless it can both 
be proved from the strata in which those relics are 
imbedded, and shown that it was produced by the 
chemical and mechanical forces to which they refer 
the geological facts on which they reason. But 
neither of these propositions can they prove. They 
do not undertake it. It were preposterous to attempt 
a demonstration from their nature, position, numbers, 
or any other consideration, that none of them 
descended from those that were created on the third, 
iifth, and sixth days of the Mosaic epoch. It were 
equally absurd to attempt to produce evidence that 
they were destroyed by chemical agents, volcanic 
fire, or the mechanical force of water. If it could be 
shown that those agents were adequate to their 
destruction, if brought in great force in contact with 
them, it is not possible to prove the fact of their con- 
tact. Here is thus another indispensable condition 
to the verification of their theory, that is taken for 
granted by them without evidence, and in contraven- 
tion of their own principles, which prohibit their 
assuming the occurrence of any geological events that 
are not demonstrable from the earth's sti-ata, and that 



IN RESPECT TO THE CKEATION OF AKIMALS. 155 

are not the result of chemical and mechanical 
forces. 

In the third place, there not only is no geological 
evidence that the animals that are fossilized were not 
either derived from those that were called into life in 
the six days of the Mosaic creation, or at a later 
epoch, but belonged to races of an anterior date ; but 
there is positive and unanswerable proof to the con- 
trary, in the fact that great numbers of those imbed- 
ded in the tertiary strata are of identically the species 
that now inhabit the seas and the earth. Thus Sir 
Charles Lyell says : 

" M. Deshayes, of Paris, well known by his conchological 
works, at my request, drew up in a tabular form a list of all 
the shells known to him to occur both in some tertiary for- 
mation and in a living state, for the express purpose of 
ascertaining the proportional number of fossil species identi- 
cal with the recent, which characterized successive groups ; 
and this table, planned by us in common, was published by 
me in 1833. The number of tertiary fossil shells examined 
by M. Deshayes was about 3,000 ; and the recent species 
with which they had been compared, about 5,000. The 
result then arrived at was, that in the lower tertiary strata, 
or those of London and Paris, there were about 3^ per 
cent, of species identical with recent ; and in the middle 
tertiary of the Loire and Gironde, about It per cent. ; and 
in the upper tertiary or sub-alpine beds, from 35 to 50 per 
cent. In formations still more modern, some of which I had 
particularly studied in Sicily, where they attain a vast 



156 DIFFICITLTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

thickness and elevation above the sea, the number of species 
identical with those now living was believed to be from 90 
to 95 per cent. ... 

" Since the year 1830, the progress of conchological sci- 
ence has been most rapid, and the number of living species 
obtained from different parts of the globe has been raised 
from about 5,000 to more than 10,000. New fossil species 
have also been added to our collections in great abundance ; 
and at the same time a more copious supply of individuals, 
both of fossil and recent species, some of which were pre- 
viously very rare, have been procured, affording more ample 
data for determining their specific character. . . . 

*' I have adopted the term post-pliocene for those strata 
which are sometimes called post-tertiary, or modern, and 
which are characterized by having all the imbedded fossil 
shells identical with species now living, whereas even the 
newer-pliocene, or newest of the tertiary deposits above 
alluded to, contain always some small proportion of shells of 
extinct species. 

" These modern formations thus defined, comprehend not 
only those strata which can be shown to have originated 
since the earth was inhabited by man, but also deposits of 
far greater extent and thickness, in which no signs of man 
or his works can be detected. In some of those of a 
date long anterior to the times of history and tradition, the 
hones of extinct quadrupeds have been met with of species 
which probably never co-existed with the human race, as for 
example, the mammoth, mastodon, megatherium, and others, 
aoid yet the shells are the same as those now living. 



IN EESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 157 

" In Ischia, near Naples, . . . Dr. Phillipi collected in the 
stratified tuff and clay ninety-two species of shells of exist- 
ing species. ... In the centre of Ischia, on the lofty hill 
called Epomeo, at the height of about 2,000 feet, ... I col- 
lected in 1828 many shells of species now inhabiting the 
neighboring gulf. It is clear, therefore, that the great mass 
of Epomeo was not only raised to its present height, but 
was also formed beneath the waters within the post-pliocene 
period. 

'^ Such an upward movement has been proved to be in 
progress in Norway and Sweden throughout an area about 
1,000 miles north and south, and for an unknown distance 
east and west. . . . Accordingly, we find near Stockholm, 
in Sweden, horizontal beds of sand loam and marl contain- 
ing the same peculiar assemblage of testacea which now live 
in the brackish waters of the Baltic. 

" On the opposite coast of Sweden, post-pliocene strata 
containing recent shells, . . * such as now live in the north- 
ern ocean, ascend to the height of 200 feet ; and beds of 
clay and sand of the same age attain an elevation of 300 
and even ^00 feet in Norway. 

"Judging by the uniformity of climate now prevailing 
from century to century, and the insensible rate of variation 
in the organic world in our own times, we may presume that an 
extremely lengthened period was required even for so slight 
a modification of the molluscous fauna, as that of which the 
evidence is here brought to light. On the other hand, we 
have every reason for inferring, on independent grounds, 
namely, the rate of upheaval of land in modern times, that 



158 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

the antiquity of the deposits in question must be very great. 
For, if we assume that the mean rate of continuous vertical 
elevation has amounted to 2|- feet in a century, and this is 
probably a high average, it would require 2t,500 years for 
the sea-coast to attain the height of tOO feet, without mak- 
ing allowance for any pauses, such as are now experienced 
in a large part of Norway, or for any oscillations of level." 
— Manual of Geology, pp. 110-115. 

Species that are now living occur in great numbers 
in the newer pliocene strata, the upper of the tertiary. 

" M. Murchison and De Yerneuil found in 1840 that the 
flat country between St. Petersburgh and Archangel, for a 
distance of 600 miles, consists of horizontal strata, full of 
shells similar to those now inhabiting the Arctic Sea, on 
which rested the boulder formation. 

" In Sweden in the neighb(?rhood of Upsala, I observed 
in 1834 a ridge of stratified sand and gravel, in the midst 
of which is a layer of marl, evidently formed originally at 
the bottom of the Baltic, by the slow growth of mussel, 
cockle, and other marine shells, intermixed with some of the 
fresh-water species. The marine shells are all of dwarfish 
size, like those now inhabiting the brackish waters of the 
Baltic ; and the marl in which myriads of them are 
imbedded is now more than 100 feet above the level of the 
Gulf of Bothnia. Upon the top of this ridge repose several 
huge erratics, consisting of gneiss, . . . which must have 
been brought into their present position since the time when 



EST EESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 159 

the neighboring gulf was already characterized by its pecu- 
liar fauna. . . . 

"The northern drift of the most southern latitudes is 
usually of the highest antiquity. In Scotland it rests on 
the older rocks, and is covered by stratified sand and clay, 
usually devoid of fossils, but in which at certain points . . . 
marine shells have been discovered. . . . Although a pro- 
portion of between 85 or 90 in 100 of the imbedded shells 
are of recent species, the remainder are unknown ; and even 
many which are recent, now inhabit more northern seas, 
where we may, perhaps, hereafter find living representatives 
of some of the unknown fossils. 

"The testaceous fauna of the boulder period in Scotland, 
England, and Ireland, has been shown by Prof. E. Eorbes 
to contain a much smaller number of species than that now 
belonging to the British seas. . . . Yet the species are nearly 
all of them now living either in the British or more northern 
seas, the shells of more arctic latitudes being the most 
abundant, and the most wide-spread throughout the entire 
area of the drift from North to South." — LyeWs Manual of 
Geol. pp. 124—126. 

" M. Deshayes and Mr. Lyell have recently proposed a 
fourfold division of the marine formations of the tertiary 
series, founded on the proportions which their fossil shells bear 
to marine shells of existing species. To these divisions Mr. 
Lyell has applied the terms eocene, miocene, older-pliocene, 
and newer-pliocene, and has most ably illustrated their his- 
tory in his Principles of Geology. 

" The term eocene implies the commencement or dawn of 



160 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

the, existing state of the animal creation ; the strata of this 
series containing a very small proportion of shells referable 
to living species. The calcaire grossier of Paris and the Lon- 
don clay are familiar examples of this older tertiary, or 
eocene formation, 

" The term miocene implies that a minority of the fossil 
shells, in formations of this period, are of recent species. To 
this are referred the fossil shells of Bordeaux, Turin, and 
Yienna. 

"In formations of the older and newer-pliocene taken 
together, the majority of the shells belong to living species ; 
the recent species in the newer being much more abundant 
than in the older division. 

" To the older pliocene belong the Sub-Appenine marine 
formations and the English Clay ; and to the newer-pliocene 
the more recent marine deposits of Sicily, Ischia, and Tus- 
cany." — Dr. BucUand^s Bridgewater Treatise, pp. 78, 19. 

A considerable number, also, of the fossil fish and 
land quadrupeds are of species that still exist. The 
tertiary strata which comprise all that are between 
the chalk formation and the diluvium, are of great 
depth, and are the depositories of bj far the most 
important classes, especially of land animals. 

" It appears that the animal kingdom was early estab- 
lished on the same general principles that now prevail ; not 
only did the four present classes of vertebrata exist ; and 
among mammalia, the orders pachydermata, carnivora, 



IN RESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 161 

rodentia, and marsupialia, but many of the genera into 
which living families are distributed, were associated 
together in the same system of adaptations and relations 
which they hold to each other in the actual creation. 

*' The bones of all these animals found in ike earliest series 
of the tertiary deposits are accompanied by the remains of rep- 
tiles, such as now inhabit the fresh waters of warm countries, 
e. g. the crocodile, emys, and tryonix. 

" The second or miocene system of tertiary deposits con- 
tains an admixture of the extinct genera of lacustrine mam- 
malia of the first or eocene series, with the earliest forms of 
genera which exist at the present time. 

"The third and fourth of pliocene divisions of the tertiary 
fresh- water deposits, . . . abound in extinct species of pachy- 
dermata, e. g. elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and 
horse, together with the extinct genera mastodon. With 
them also occur the first abundant traces of the ruminantia, 
e. g. oxen and deer. 

" The seas, also, of the miocene and pliocene periods were 
inhabited by marine mammalia, consisting of whales, dol- 
phins, seals, walrus, and the lamantin, or manati, whose 
existing species are chiefly found near the coasts and mouths 
of rivers in the torrid zone. — Buddand^s Bridg. Treatise, 
pp. 8t-92. 

" The largest, the most ferocious, and the least useful of 
the pliocene species have perished ; but the horse, the ass, 
the hog, probably the smaller wild ox, the goat, the red- 
deer, and roe, and many of the- diminutive quadrupeds 
remain It is probable that the horse and ass are 



162 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

descendants of a species of pliocene antiquity in Europe. 
There is no anatomical character by which the present wild 
boar can be distinguished specifically from that which was 
contemporary with the mammoth. ^11 the species of Euro- 
pean pliocene Bovidae come down to the historical period, and 
the aurochs and musk ox still exist. . . . There is evidence 
that the great bos pimigenius, and the small bos longifrons, 
which date by fossils from the time of the mammoth, con- 
tinued to exist in this island after it became inhabited by 
man. The small short-horned pliocene ox is most probably 
still preserved in the mountain varieties of our domestic cat- 
tle. The great urus seems never to have been tamed, but 
to have been finally extirpated in Scotland. Of the cervine 
tribe, the red-deer and the roebuck still exist in the moun- 
tainous districts of the north." — R. Owen^s Hist. Brit. Fossil 
Mammalia and Birds, Introd. p. xxxii. 

Tlie period supposed by geologists to have inter- 
vened between the deposition of the eocene strata, in 
which a share of these fossils is found, and tlie epoch 
of the six days' creation, they regard as immense. 
Thus Prof. Owen says : 

" "With the last layer of the eocene deposits, we lose in 
this island every trace of the mammalia of that remote 
period. The imagination strives in vain to form an idea 
commensurate with the evidence of the intervening opera- 
tions which continental geology teaches to have gradually 
and successively taken place — of the length of time that elap- 



IN EESPECT TO THE CKE.VTIOX OF ANIMxiLS. 163 

sed lefore the foundations of England were again suficiently 
settled to serve as the theatre of life to another rc^e of warm- 
blooded quadrupeds. 

"la the endeavor to trace the origin of our existing mam- 
malia, I have been led to view them as descendants of a por- 
tion of a peculiar and extensive matnmalian Fauna, which 
overspread Europe and Asia at a period geologically recent, 
yet incalculably remote, and long anterior to any evidence or 
record of the human ro-ce^ — Hist. Brit. Fos. pp. xxi-xxxv. 

Sir C. Lyell refers tlie strata in wliich they are im- 
bedded to an equally remote age. 

'' It would be rash to infer that these quadrupeds " — the 
mastodons, found in New Jersey and New York — '' were 
mired in modern times, unless we use that term strictly in a 
geological sense. I have shown that there is a fluviatile 
deposit in the valley of the Niagara, containing shells of the 
genera Melania, Lymnea, Planorbis, Yalvata, Cyclas, TJnio, 
and Helix, &c., all of recent species, from which the bones 
of the great mastodon have been taken in a very perfect state. 
Yet the whole excavation of the ravine, for many miles 
below the Falls, has been slowly effected, since that fluvia- 
tile deposit was thrown down. 

" Whether or not, in assigning a period of more than 
30,000 years for the recession of the Falls from Queenstown 
to their present site, I have over or under estimated the 
time required for that operation, uo one can doubt that a 
vast number of centuries must have elapsed before so great a 



164 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

series of geographical changes were brought about as have 
occurred since the entombment of this elephantine quadru- 
ped. The fresh-water gravel which encloses it, is decidedly 
of much more modern origin than the drift or boulder clay 
of the same region." — Man. Geol., p. 138. 

'No demonstration could be more absolute tban is 
presented by these facts that a large share of the pre- 
sent races of animals are derived from those that are 
fossilized, and had their origin, therefore, in the same 
creative fiat. There is no maxim more fundamental 
and indisputable in zoology than that all animals of 
the same species had a common parentage, or are to 
be traced to the same creation. To reject that axiom, 
v^ould be to reject the tie that connects effects with 
their causes, and render it nugatory to reason on the 
subject. The supposition, therefore, that the fossilized 
races were wholly exterminated antecedently to the 
six days' creation, and that the present living races 
had an independent origin at that epoch, is shown to 
be erroneous. Those geologists who hold that the 
present races were called into being at that date, 
must, if they adhere to the maxims of zoology, admit 
that those that are entombed in the tertiary deposits 
had their origin also at the same era. 

But the proof does not stop here. There is ample 
evidence that there never was an absolute break in 
the descent of certain classes of marine animals, from 



m RESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 165 

the date of tlie first that were fossilized down to the 
races that now inhabit the seas. For those in the ter- 
tiary strata of the genera and species that are now 
living, were contemporaneous with others now extinct 
that are fossilized in the strata of an earlier date ; and 
they in their first periods were contemporaneous with 
other genera and species that Avere fossilized at a still 
earlier date, and these last were coeval with still 
other genera and species that appear in a still lower 
series of rocks ; and so on to the lowest strata that 
contain fossil shells. An unbroken chain of coexist- 
ing genera and species can be made out from the date 
of the first to the races of the present hour. 

" We find certain families of organic remains pervading 
strata of every age, under nearly the same generic forms 
which they present among existing organizations ; e. g. the 
nautilus, echinus, terebratula, and various forms of corals ; 
and among plants, the ferns, lycopodiacese, and palms. 
Other families, both of animals and vegetables, are limited 
to particular formations, there being certain points where 
entire groups ceased to exist, and were replaced by others 
of a different character." — Dr, Buckland^s Bridg. Treat.^ p. 
100. 

'' By selecting genera and famiUe^, we may show through 
what ranges of strata, that is to say, through what geologi- 
cal periods, they existed, and at what periods they were the 
most numerous. Thus Trilobites existed during the primary 



166 DIFFICULTIES OF GE0L0GIST8 

and carboniferous epoclis, but are never known in the more 
recent strata, nor do they exist at present ; Proiuctaa pass 
through the primary and carboniferous epochs, and end in 
. the saliferous ; Spiriferae pass through all these epochs, and 
end in the oolites ; Ammonites pass through all these 
periods, and end in the chalk ; Terebratulse* existed through 
all these periods, and also through the tertiary system, and 
are still in being. On the other hand, certain tribes began 
to exist at later periods, as the Belemites, many genera of 
Echini, &c., and ended their race before the dawn of the 
tertiary period." — Phillij^s's Guide, p. 75. 

There are similar proofs also of the continuance of 
certain classes of vegetables from the period of the 
earliest strata to the present time. 

" From the data hitherto obtaiuea, tne most eminent 
botanists consider that the Floras of the ancient world con- 
stitute three distinct epochs or eras. 

"The first comprehends the earliest strata in which traces 
of vegetation appear, and includes the carboniferous. The 
plants of this epoch, as we have already shown, consist of 
fuci and other cellular tribes ; ferns of various kinds in great 



Thus of Terebratulge there were — 




la the Primary fossiliferous strata 


. 30 genera. 


In the Carboniferous system 


. 16 « 


In the Saliferous system 


. 14 " 


In the Oolitic system 


. 49 " 


In the Cretaceous system 


. 57 " 


In the Tertiary strata 


. 18 " 




Phillips's Guide, p. 76. 



IN KESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMAXS. 167 

abundance ; coniferous trees related to species of warm cli- 
mates ; of palms and other monocotyledons, gigantic lyco- 
podia, and trees (Sigillaria) in great abundance, wbose pre- 
cise relations to known forms are not accurately determined. 
In this Flora the tree ferns predominate, constituting nearly 
two-thirds of the whole known species ; and the general 
type of the vegetation is analogous to that of the islands and 
archipelagoes of intertropical climates. 

'' The second epoch extends from the New Red or Salife- 
rous strata to the Chalk inclusive, and is characterized by 
the appearance of many species of Cycadese, Zamise, and 
other ConiferjB, while the proportion of ferns is much less than 
in the preceding period ; and the lycopodiaceous tribes, Cala- 
mites, &c., of the carboniferous strata are absent. A Flora 
of this nature is analogous to that of the coasts and maritime 
districts of New Holland and the Cape of Good Hope. 

" The third epoch is that of the tertiary, in which dico- 
tyledonous tribes appear in great numbers, the Cycadeae are 
very rare, the ferm^ in diminished numbers, and the Coniferae 
more numerous. Palms and other intertropicals are found 
associated with the existing European forest trees, as the 
elm, ash, willow, poplar, &c., presenting, in short, the gene- 
ral features of our continental Elora." — ManteWs Medals of 
Creation^ vol. i., pp. 200, 201. 

These facts thus completely confute the assumption 
that an extermination of the vegetables and animals 
took place between the fossilization of those that are 
imbedded in the strata and those that were called into 
life at the epoch of the six days' creation. The chain 



168 DIFFICTJLTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

of coexistence is shown, bv the discoveries geologists 
have ah'eady made, to have extended without an 
interval from the first to the last ; and the proofs of 
the uninterruptedness of the line will be augmented 
at every step in the progress of the science. The ex- 
aminations have hitherto been confined to compara- 
tively a few sites, chiefly in Europe. When they 
shall have been made on a greater scale there, and 
extended to western, northern, and eastern Asia, 
Africa, INTorth and South Arnerica, and the islands of 
the Pacific and Indian oceans, the evidences of the 
unbroken continuance of vegetable and animal life 
through the whole series of the strata to the present 
hour, will undoubtedly accumulate to an indisputable- 
ness and vastness that must for ever set aside the 
fancy of their extermination at any point in the suc- 
cession. 

And finally, their theory is equally inconsistent 
with the history of the deluge. The sacred writer 
relates that '' the waters prevailed exceedingly upon 
the earth, and all the high hills that were under the 
whole heaven were covered. Fifteen cubits and 
upward did the water prevail ; and the mountains 
were covered." And as a consequence, " all flesh 
died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and 
of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing 
that creepeth upon the earth, and every man. All 
in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that 



IN EESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 169 

was on the dry land died," Genesis vii. 19-22. As 
the waters of the globe were wholly inadequate to 
cover its whole surface to such a depth, if the hills 
and mountains continued to maintain their elevation, 
it is manifest that they must have been depressed to 
near the general line of the lands, and the whole 
body of the continents and islands carried down to a 
level with the bottom of the seas ; or else the sur- 
faces on which the seas rested must have been 
elevated to the line of the continents and islands. 
Whether the hills and mountains of the antediluvian 
globe equalled in height those that now stud the 
surface of the earth, we have no means of knowing.* 
The present system of mountains and hills must 
indisputably, therefore, have received at least their 
main upheaval since the flood reached its height ; 
and probably most of them, at the period when the 
continents and islands on which they rise were 
elevated to their present position, and the waters of 
the deluge again thrown back into the seas and 
oceans which now surround them. 

The advocates of the geological theory, however, 
assign our present mountains and hills a far earlier 
date, and assert that many of them at least have 

* " If we suppose the elevation of one part to be compensated by 
the depression of another, the ocean level will vary merely as the 
quantity of land above its surface. If we suppose all the dry land 
to sink till it be submerged, it will cause the ocean to rise about 250 
feet." — Phillips'' s Guide to Geol. p. 49. 



170 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

existed through a vast series of ages. The supposition 
that they were thrown up from the sea at so late an 
epoch as the deluge, they reject as little better than a 
solecism. They are thus again in conflict with the 
sacred record. ITo hyjoothesis can reconcile them ; 
no artifice — if the theory is held to be true — can 
shield the text from the discredit of a consummate 
error. 

Such are the proofs that this great doctrine of 
modern speculative geology presents, at every step, 
the most direct and absolute contradiction to the 
history God has given us of the creation and 
deluge. If that doctrine be true, the record in 
Genesis cannot be. They are at an infinite distance 
from each other in respect to each of the acts by 
which God accomplished the six days' work. The 
sacred record ascribes the creation of the heavens 
and earth to the first of the six days. The theory 
asserts that they had then existed through an 
immeasurable round of ages. The inspired history 
assigns the creation of light to the first day. The 
theory affirms that the sun had then existed and 
shone on the earth through an incalculable series of 
years. The Bible testifies that God created the 
atmosphere on the second day. The theory asserts 
that it had before enveloped the globe through 
periods whose duration we caunot estimate. The 
sacred history relates that the seas were first formed, 



IN KESPECT TO THE CKEATION OF ANENIALS. 171 

and dry land made to appear on the third day after 
the creation of the earth. The theory declares that 
they had existed through innnmerable ages anterior 
to that epoch. The sacred history teaches that on 
the fourth day the earth first received that adjust- 
ment to the sun, moon, and stars, by which they 
determine the succession of seasons and years, and 
the variations of the days and nights. The geolo- 
gical theory assigns that arrangement to an immea- 
surably earlier date. The inspired record refers the 
creation of plants to the third day, the creation of 
fish and fowls to the fifth, and the creation 6f land 
animals to the sixth. The theory declares that 
record to be contradicted by the relics that lie buried 
in the strata of the earth, and affirms that they were 
created at an epoch incalculably earlier, and flou- 
rished through a vast tract of ages that intervened, 
to the time of the six days' creation. And finally, 
the Bible represents that at the deluge the whole 
earth was overspread by the ocean, which implies 
that the mountains and hills were depressed, and 
near a level produced between the bed of the ocean 
and the continents and islands. The geological theory 
controverts that representation, and maintains that 
the present mountains and hills were formed at an 
epoch immeasurably more remote. They are thus, 
on all these subjects, in the most open and undis- 
guised antagonism. Had it been the object of its 



172 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

authors to devise a theory, in conflict in every 
element with the inspired history, they could not 
have formed one more conspicuously and absolutely 
of that character. Strauss's hypothesis respecting 
the fa'cts of Christ's birth, ministry, miracles, death, 
and resurrection, is not more at antipodes with the 
gospel narrative, than this is with the record God has 
given of the creation and deluge. The great postu- 
lates on which it proceeds — that the earth anterior to 
the six days' creation was reduced to a "wreck," 
mountains and hills obliterated from its bosom, the 
light of the sun extinguished, the atmosphere anni- 
hilated, the earth deprived of its inclination to the 
ecliptic, and races of vegetables and animals that 
had inhabited it exterminated — are equally incon- 
sistent with the axioms of the science. Like Buffon's 
hypothesis respecting the origin of the solar system, 
and Whiston's theory of the cause of the deluge, 
they are at war alike with the principles of geology 
and the laws of nature, and could never have been 
entertained, had their advocates duly considered the 
assumptions which they involve, and the embarrass- 
ments in which they entangle them. 

The fancy, then, that the theory has been recon- 
ciled, or is reconcilable with the Mosaic record, must 
be abandoned. The verification of their postulates, 
which is necessary in order that they may proceed 
on them as £acts, they can never accomplish. They 



IN RESPECT TO THE CREATION OF ANIMALS. 173 

might as well attempt, by chemistiy and mechanics, 
to bring the antipodes into our hemisphere, as to 
bring their fancied record of the rocks into unison 
with that of Genesis. They might as well undertake 
to compress the universe into the dimensions of the 
earth, • as to attempt to shrink their fabulous ages 
into harmony with the six days of the creation. 

There is no consistent medium, therefore, between 
the rejection of their theory and the rejection of the 
Bible. Geologists and their disciples must, indeed, 
on their principles, abandon the hypothesis on which 
they have proceeded, and discard the inference of a 
prior existence of the vegetables and animals, which 
they have mistaken for a scientific deduction' — as 
they are as inconsistent with the maxims of geology 
as they are with allegiance to the volume of inspi- 
ration. 

On the other hand, the believers in revelation, and 
expositors of the sacred word especially, must 
adhere, in the interpretation of the inspired history, 
to the laws of philology, and receive and maintain 
the narrative of the creation as of absolute truth and 
authority ; and they surely cannot need more ample 
means than are furnished by the foregoing considera- 
tions to shield it from the imputations which have 
been cast on it by the geological theory. 



174: DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

QUESTIONS. 

What were the creative acts of the fifth and sixth days ? Are not 
these irreconcilable with the geological theory, which aflarms that 
the animals and vegetables that are buried in the strata, existed 
innumerable ages before this epoch ? Do not geologists admit that 
man had no being anterior to the sixth day ? Does not the sacred 
narrative teach with equal clearness, that the beasts of the earth had 
no existence before that day, nor fish nor fowls before the fifth day, 
nor vegetables before the third ? Is it not as contradictory to the 
text, to assert that animals and vegetables had existed millions of 
years anterior to the six days' creation, as it would be to assert that 
man had ? Do not geologists indeed admit that the sacred narrative, 
according to the literal import of its language, is at open war with 
their theory? By what means then do they attempt to bring them 
into harmony ? State Dr. Buckland's expedient. State Dr. Hitch- 
cock's. Is not this an explicit admission that the declarations of the 
sacred text are to be deliberately set aside, in defiance of the laws 
of language, and the doctrine of the geological theory substituted in 
their place ? Is such an undisguised elevation of the hypotheses of 
geologist^ to a higher authority than the word of God, entitled to be 
dignified with the name of science ? Is it anything else than an 
attempt to fix the brand of falsehood on His word, because it contra- 
dicts their speculations ? Is not Dr. Hitchcock mistaken in imagin- 
ing that the language of the history of the creation and other parts of 
the Scriptures is inconsistent with the real nature of the facts which 
they respect ? Is it not as literally true and proper to say that the 
sun rises and sets, as it is to say that the earth turns on its axis, so 
as to produce that apparent motion of the sun ? Are not mankind 
accustomed to express themselves in that manner in regard to all 
the facts which they perceive by the senses? Give examples. Do 
not geologists themselves use similar language in the description of 
the facts of geology ? If the principle of interpretation for which 
Dr. Hitchcock contends in respect to the language of the senses is 



m EESPECT TO THE CREATIOI;^^ OF ANIMALS. 175 

applied to the terms and phraseology of geology, will it not strike 
the whole of its facts from existence, as effectually as it would those 
of the sacred text which it is employed to annihilate ? Do geologists 
adhere to their method of interpreting the history of the six days, 
when they come to the creation of man ? Would not consistency 
require them to ? Were human skeletons found intermixed with the 
fossil animals and vegetables that are imbedded in the strata, which 
they refer to ages that preceded the creation narrated in Genesis, 
would not consistency oblige them to assert that man had existed 
many ages before the creation of Adam and Eve ? Is not their 
theory of the existence of plants and animals ages before the creation 
recorded by Mjses, unwarrantable by their own principles, as well as 
contradictory to the sacred word ? Show how it is forbidden by their 
axioms. But is not their theory confuted by the fact that many of 
the plants and animals that now subsist, are of the same species as 
those that are buried in the strata, and which geologists affirm had 
their existence anterior to the creation of the present races? In 
what great division of the strata are these fossils principally found ? 
What species of animal relics are the most numerous? In what 
countries are they found ? Are fossil fish and land quadrupeds also 
found in those strata ? Specify some of the quadrupeds which are 
still common. Do geologists refer the formation of the strata in 
which these animals are buried, to ages long anterior to the Mosaic 
epoch of the creation ? What language does Prof. Owen employ to 
express his views of their antiquity ? To how remote a period does 
Sir C. Lyell refer bones of the Mastodon found near Niagara ? But 
beyond this, are there not evidences that certain classes of animals 
that now exist, have existed at every period from the first strata in 
which fossils are found? Does not that prove that there has never 
been an absolute extinction of those races from the period in which 
they first appear in the strata, to the present time ; and confute 
the pretence therefore, that the present races of animals arc of a 
wholly different creation, from those that are buried in the strata ? 
Are there not classes of plants also now existing, that have existed 



176 DIFFICULTIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

through every period during which the fossilized strata were form- 
ing ? Does not that prove that no extermination of vegetables took 
place between the fossilization of those that are buried in the strata, 
and the creation of those that now spring from the soil ? Is not their 
theory irreconcilable also with the deluge ? Point out the manner 
in which it contradicts it. Is it not clear then, that this doctrine of 
geology, is in the most palpable contradiction to the sacred history of 
the creation and deluge ? State the principal points on which they 
contravene each other. Is there any consistent medium then, between 
either rejecting their theory, or rejecting the inspiration of the 
Bible? 



EESPECTESTG THIS MATERIALS OF THE BTRATA. 177 



CHAPTER YIII. 

The false Theories of Geologists respecting the Sources of the Materials of which 
the Strata were formed. 

It was tlie object of tlie preceding chapters, to 
show that the theory of the vast age of the world 
is irreconcilable with the inspired l^istory of the 
creation ; and that the great postulates on which it 
proceeds, respecting a chaotic condition of the earth, 
an extinction of light, an annihilation of an atmos- 
phere, an erosion of mountains, a change of the 
earth's axis in relation to the ecliptic, and an exter- 
mination of vegetables and animals, are unauthorized 
and incompatible with the principles of geology. 
We now proceed to show that the theories respecting 
the mode in which the strata of the earth were 
formed and brought into the condition in which they 
now subsist, which geologists make a principal 
ground of their inference that immense periods must 
have been occupied in the process, are in like 
manner mistaken, and inconsistent both with the 
facts and with the maxims of the science. 

That deduction they found — not directly on the 
strata themselves, but — mainly, first, on an assump- 

8^- 



178 FALSE THEOKEES OF aEOLOGISTS 

tion respecting the sources whence the materials of 
which they consist were derived ; next, on an hypo- 
thesis respecting the forces by which those materials 
were transported to the places of their deposition, 
arranged in their several combinations, and thrown 
into the conditions in which they now exist ; and 
thirdly — which holds but a very subordinate place in 
their reasonings — on a theory respecting the produc- 
tion and destruction of the vegetables and animals, 
the relics of which are imbedded in the strata.* As 
the facts theraselves of the science are not the basis 
directly of their deduction of the period which they 
assign to the formation of the strata, but hypotheses 
respecting the causes and processes to which they 



* " The whole period occupied in the deposition of the fossiliferous 
rocks must have been immensely long. There must have been time 
for water to have made depositions more than six miles in thickness, 
by materials worn from previous rocks, and more or less commi- 
nuted ; time enough, also, to allow of hundreds of changes in the 
materials deposited, such changes as now require a long period for 
the production of one of them ; time enough to allow of the growth 
and dissolution of animals and plants often of microscopic littleness, 
sufficient to constitute almost entire mountains of their remains ; 
time enough to produce, by an extremely slow change of climate, 
the destruction of several nearly entire groups of organic beings ; 
for although sudden catastrophes may have sometimes been the 
immediate cause of their extinction, there is reason to believe those 
catastrophes did not usually happen till such a change had taken 
place in the physical condition of the globe as to render it no longer 
a comfortable habitation for beings of their organization. We must 
judge of the time requisite for these deposits by sirnilar operations 
now in progress ; and those are in general extremely slow." — 
Hitchcock's Geology of Massachusetts, p. 773. 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 179 

owe their existence, those facts themselves do not 
demonstrate that deduction. In order to sustain it, 
they must jprom that the materials of the strata were 
drawn from the sources to which they refer them ; 
that they were borne to their respective places, 
arranged in their combinations, and subjected to the 
modifications which they have undergone, by the 
forces to which they ascribe those processes. If they 
cannot verify these hypotheses, if they are inconsis- 
tent with the facts of the science and the laws them- 
selves of matter, then their deduction from them of 
the vast age of the world falls to the ground. On 
the other hand, the claims of that inference to be 
regarded as a scientific deduction will be confuted, 
if we simply show that the postulates from which it 
is drawn are merely supposititious, not demonstrated. 
If, in addition to that, we prove also that they are 
altogether irreconcilable with the facts and princi- 
ples of the science, and the laws of nature, and 
infinitely self-contradictory, we shall furnish all the 
evidence that can be required to overthrow their 
theory ; and that we propose to do. 

Of the two great postulates on which they mainly 
found their deduction of the great age of the world, 
that which relates to the geological agents is, as stated 
in a former chapter, that the forces by which the 
strata of the earth were originally formed and subse- 
quently modified, were those of chemistry, fire, and 



180 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

water, which are now acting on the globe, and pro- 
ducing somewhat similar effects ; and that the energy 
with which they are now exerting their powers, and 
the scale on which they are giving birth to changes 
in the earth's surface, are to be taken as the measure 
of their intensity, and the rapidity with which they 
wrought their several effects in the formation of the 
strata. There is, indeed, some diversity of opinion 
among them in respect to this branch of the hypo- 
thesis. Thus Sir H. T. De la Eeche says : 

" The two prevailing theories of the present time are — 1st, 
That which attributes all geological phenomena to such 
effects [operations] of existing causes as we now witness ; 
and 2d, That which considers them referable to a series of 
catastrophes, or sudden revolutions. The difference in the 
two theories is not in reality very great ; the question being 
merely one of intensity of forces, so that probably by uniting 
the two we should approximate nearer to the truth." — Mcu- 
nual of Geology, p. 32. 

He accordingly, and all others who regard the for- 
mation of the strata as having occupied immense 
periods, hold that though at some few stages — as in 
the elevation of mountains, the dislocation of the 
strata, and their subsequent denudation — volcanic 
fires and the waters of the ocean must have acted 
with far greater energy than ordinarily ; yet that, in 
tbo ipain, the rate at which they are now giving birth 



RESPECTING- THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 181 

to their several effects is to*be taken as tlie measure 
of their past agency. The mode in which this theory- 
is advanced by them was exemplified in a former 
chapter, by a variety of passages from the leading 
writers. "We add a few others : 

•'It is only by carefully considering the combined action 
of all the causes of change now in operation, whether in the 
animate or inanimate world, that we can hope to explain 
such complicated appearances as are exhibited in the gene- 
ral arrangement of mineral masses." — Ly ell's Principles, vol. 
ii., p. 210. 

" The geologist must on no account think it out of the 
bounds of his legitimate province to examine with care and 
interest into the history of the processes now performed in 
the ocean and on land ; for it is only by discrimination and 
generalization of these that we can hope to draw satisfactory 
inferences concerning the force and direction of the agencies 
formerly exerted in earlier oceans, and on earlier continents^ 
— Phillips's Guide, p. 102. 

"It is presumed that the reader will ... be convinced 
that the forces formerly employed to o-emodel the crust of the 
earth, were the same in kind and energy as those now acting ; 
or at least he will perceive that the opposite hypothesis is 
very questionable." — LyeWs Principles, pref. xi. 

" Moving water is the only agent known to us capable 
of carrying away the great collective mass of rock " — that 



182 FALSE THEORIES OP GEOLOGISTS 

has been swept from the mountains and hills. " In order, 
therefore, to form a just conception of the, time and conditions 
required to produce the effects observed, we should carefully 
examine the latter, and estimate the transporting powers of 
those waters which now exist among the mountains them- 
selves, and which transport detrital matter from the central 
parts outwards." — Sir H. T. Dela Beche's Theoretical Geo- 
logy, p U1. 

" The immense period requisite to wear away such a mass 
of rock as this theory supposes to have once occupied the 
whole valley of the Connecticut, will seem to most minds 
the strongest objection to its adoption ; I mean, supposing 
it to have been effected by such causes as are operating at pre- 
sent. But this is not a solitary example, in which geologi- 
cal phenomena indicate the operation of existing causes 
through periods of duration inconceivably long. We may 
in this case, indeed, suppose the occurrence of other agencies 
in the earlier periods of our globe. Still even with this aid 
the work must have been immensely protracted. And why 
should we hesitate to admit the existence of our globe 
through periods as long as geological researches require ?'' 
— Hitchcock's Geology of Massachusetts, p. 339. 

These views are advanced by a crowd of other 
writers. There is no element of their speculations in 
which the J more generally agree, than that the 
causes to which the strata owe their origin and 
modifications, were those now in activity on the 



EESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA. 183 

globe, and tliat they produced their effects bj 
agencies in the main of only their present energy. 

Their other great postulate is, that the stratified 
portions of the crust of the earth were formed 
mainly from the detritus of rocky continents and 
islands, and borne down to the ocean by rivers, or 
beat off by waves from the shores, and distributed 
over the bottom of the sea by tides and currents. 
Thus Dr. Buckland :— 

" Beneath the whole series of stratified rocks that appear 
on the surface of the globe, there probably exists a founda- 
tion of unstratified crystalline rocks, bearing an irregular 
surface, from the detritus of which the materials of stratified 
rocks have in great measure been derived, either directly 
by the accumulation of the ingredients of disintegrated 
granitic rocks, or indirectly by the repeated destruction of 
different classes of stratified rocks, the materials of which 
had, by prior operations, been derived from unstratified 
formations, amounting to a thickness of many miles. This 
is indeed but a small depth in comparison with the 
diameter of the globe ; but small as it is, it affords certain 
evidence of a long series of changes and revolutions, affect- 
ing not only the mineral condition of the nascent surface 
of the earth, but attended also by important alterations in 
animal and vegetable life. 

'' The detritus of the first dry lands being drifted into 
the sea and there spread out into extensive beds of mud 
and sand and gravel, would for ever have remained beneath 



184 FALSE THE0EIE3 OF GEOLOGISTS 

the surface of the water, had not other forces been subse- 
quently employed to raise them into dry land. 

" Wherever solid matter arose above the water, it 
became exposed to destruction by atmospheric agents j by 
rains, torrents, and inundations, at that tune probably 
acting with intense violence, and washing down and spread- 
ing forth in the form of mud and sand and gravel upon the 
bottom of the then existing seas, the materials of primary 
stratified rocks, which by subsequent exposure to various 
degrees of subterranean heat, became converted into beds 
of gneiss, and mica slate, and hornblende slate, and clay 
slate. In the detritus thus swept from the early lands into 
the most ancient seas, we view the commencement of that 
enormous series of derivative strata which by long contin- 
ued repetition of similar processes have been accumulated 
to a thickness of many miles." — Bridgewater Treatise, pp. 
42, 50, 51. 

"Thus the origin of strata is derived from depositions of 
the materials of the dry land under the waters of the sea, 
and, In some cases, of great inland lakes intermixed with 
the spoils of animals that have lived and died through a 
long succession of ages. If the daily causes of waste 
pulverize the solid mountains, and the rivers transport their 
ruins to the sea, so other causes acting more extensively 
and powerfully, must be allowed a share in producing and 
depositing the materials to which we owe our present 
stratified rocks. The extent and nature of those opera- 
tions will be fully examined in its proper place, as they are 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 185 

now in progress, or are past ; and as they include the geology 
which relates to the present surface of the earth. In the ruins 
of an ancient earth we find the materials which formed the 
present; as in the destruction of the land which we now 
inhabit nature seems to be preparing habitations for future 
races of animated beings. 

" But though I have here said that causes operating more 
extensively and powerfully than the slow actions of waste 
and transportation may have aided in preparing the mate- 
rials of the strata, we must beware of allowing more eJBfect 
than they were capable of producing, as has been done by 
those who object to certain geological claims on indefinite 
time, and who seek for solutions in transitory diluvian 
powers. The effects of such torrents must have been to 
deposit mixed materials of various sizes in a confused man- 
ner ; and they could therefore have prepared the germs of 
the conglomerated strata only. The strata formed of finer 
materials must have been the consequences of tedious actions, 
analogous to those which we daily witness ; while their 
separation into distinct rocks, into alternations of clay and 
sand, producing schist and sandstone, must have equally 
been the w^ork of a slow process beneath the water.^' — Mac- 
culloch^s Geology, vol. i. pp. 81, 82. 

" Denudation is the removal of sohd matter by running 
water, whether by a river or marine current, and the con- 
sequent laying bare of some inferior rock. Geologists have, 
perhaps, been seldom in the habit of reflecting that this ope- 
ration has exerted an influence on the structure of the earth's 
crust as universal and important as sedimentary deposition 



186 FALSE THEOEEES OF GEOLOGISTS 

itself-; for denudation is the inseparable accompaniment of 
the production of all new strata of mechanical origin. The 
formation of every new deposit by the transport of sediment 
and pebbles necessarily implies that there has been some- 
where else a grinding down of rocks into rounded fragments, 
sand, or mud, equal in quantity to the new strata. All depo- 
sitions, therefore, except in the case of a shower of volcanic 
ashes, is the sign of superficial waste going on contemporane- 
ously, and to an equal amount elsewhere. The gain at one 
point is no more than sufficient to balance the loss at some 
other. 

" If then the entire mass of stratified deposits in the earth's 
crust is at once, the monument and measure of the denudation 
which has taken place, on how stupendous a scale ought we 
to find the signs of this removal of transported materials in 
past ages ? 

" Professor Ramsay has shown that the missing beds 
removed from the summit of the Mendips must have been 
nearly a mile in thickness, and he has pointed out consider- 
able areas in South Wales and some of the adjacent coun- 
ties of England where a series of palaeozoic strata not less 
than 11,000 feet in thickness have been stripped off. All 
these materials have of course been transported to new 
regions, and have entered into the composition of more 
modern formations. On the other hand, it is shown by 
observations in the same ' Survey,' that the palaeozoic strata 
are from 20,000 to 30,000 feet thick. It is clear that such 
rocks, formed of mud and sand, now for the most part con- 
solidated, are the monuments of denuding operations, which 



EESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 187 

took place at a very remote period in the earth's history." 
— LycWs Manual, pp. 66-68. 

" The strata are accumulations of consolidated sand and 
other detritus, the sedimentary deposits of rivers and seas, 
combined with the durable remains of animals and plants. 

"From the first moment that dry land appeared on the 
earth's surface, whatever may have been the material of 
which it was composed, the disintegrating effects of atmo- 
spheric agents and of water in motion must have commenced. 
The detritus thus produced transported to the tranquil 
depths of the ocean, would then subside in successive layers, 
and a series of sedimentary strata be gradually formed ; 
and after the creation of living things, the durable remains 
of animals and vegetables must have become intermingled 
with the detritus of the land, and imbedded in the deposits 
then in progress. 

" If the land were sterile, destitute of vegetation, and 
untenanted by any species of animals, the relics of the inha- 
bitants of the sea would alone be imbedded ; on the con- 
trary, if the sediments were produced by the action of 
streams and rivers flowing through a country covered with 
forests, and swarming with animal life, the strata accumu- 
lated in lakes and inland bays would teem with the remains 
of terrestrial and fluviatile animals and plants." — ManteWs 
Geological Principles, in his Excursion round the Isle of 
Wight, pp. 56-58. 

" It is universally admitted that the materials of the 
sedimentary strata . . . are derived from the disintegration, 



188 FAXSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

decomposition, and abrasion of older rocks, and from animal 
and vegetable secretions." — Mather^ Geology of the first 
Geological District of New York, p. 273. 

They thus universally exhibit the strata as formed 
from detritus borne down by streams and rivers from 
pre-existing continents and islands and distributed 
over the bed of the sea. 

The surface of that imagined primitive earth, in- 
stead of loose soils and strata that are easily disinte- 
grated and borne by torrents and rivers to the sea, 
consisted, according to these writers, exclusively of 
granite, one of the most solid and indestructible of 
the rocks. 

" Assuming that the whole materials of the globe may 
have once been in a fluid or even a nebular state, from the 
presence of intense heat, the passage of the first consolida- 
ted portions of this fluid or nebulous matter to a solid state 
may have been produced by the radiation of heat from its 
surface into space ; the gradual abstraction of such heat 
would allow the particles of matter to approximate and 
crystallize ; and the first result of this crystallization might 
have been the formation of a shell or crust, composed of 
oxidated metals and metalloids, constituting various rocks of 
the granitic series, around an incandescent nucleus of melted 
matter heavier than granite." — Bucklomdh Brid^gewater 
Treatise, p. 40. 

" That granite has in reality furnished a very large part 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 189 

of the materials of the recent strata, is proved by their con- 
stitution. Quartz, felspar, mica, and hornblende are the 
chief materials of the sandstone, shales, and clays ; nay, the 
very fragments of that rock are found everywhere. Even 
in our recent alluvial soils they abound ; and it is a ques- 
tion worth considering whether the granite boulders, of 
which the immediate origin has so often been vainly traced, 
are not rather the portions of decomposed conglomerate 
strata, or the more durable remains of the alluvial soils on 
which they now repose." — Macculloc/i's Geology, vol. i., p. 
155. 

" He who shall divest the present surface of all but its 
rocks, who shall extermiEate from our maps the great 
alluvial plains and deltas of the globe, with the countless 
interior tracts of the same nature, will produce a sketch of 
the original earth in no small degree interesting. It is 
through decomposition and disintegration, aided by mechan- 
ical power, that these changes have been produced." — Mac- 
culloch^s Geolog-y, vol. ii. p. 2. 

"We sliall have occasion in the course of the discus- 
sion to cite other passages in which the same views 
are presented. According to the theory, then, the 
continents from which the vast materials of the sedi- 
mentary strata were originally drawn, consisted 
throughout their whole mass of granite, and it was 
by the slow process of disintegration by the action 
of the atmosphere, heat, moisture, frost, rains, tor- 



190 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

rents, and rivers, that that generally hard and almost 
unyielding substance was reduced to fragments and 
minute particles, and transported to the sea. 

The question now is, whether they have demon- 
strated these great postulates. It is not enough to 
authorize the stupendous inference they have 
grounded on them respecting the age of the world, 
and invest it with the character of a scientific deduc- 
tion according " to the strictest rules of the Baconian 
philosophy," to show that they are possibly or even 
probably true. They must be established by the 
most unanswerable evidence, in order that they can 
serve as a foundation for the vast fabric which is 
attempted to be erected on them. If they are mere 
suppositions, or gratuitous assumptions — if, instead 
of being demonstrated, they involve gross self-contra- 
dictions, and are irreconcilable alike with the laws 
of matter and the principles of geology, then the 
lofty structure which has been reared on them must 
be equally unsubstantial ; and such we shall now 
proceed to show is their character. 

The question which first requires consideration res- 
pects the sources from wliich the materials of the 
strata were drawn. And we remark in the first place 
that it is a mere hypothesis, not a demonstrated fact, 
that they were derived from continents, islands, or 
mountains that consisted exclusively of granite. These 
writers have not proved it. They do not even claim 



EESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 191 

to have demonstrated it. They have taken it for 
granted, or advanced it simply as a supposition that 
furnishes in their judgment a more probable explana- 
tion than any other of the formation of the primary 
crust of the earth, and of the origin of the materials 
of the strata that were subsequently imposed on the 
primitive rocks. Thus Dr. Buckland says : — • 

"As the materials of the stratified rocks are in great 
degree derived directly or indirectly from those which are 
iinstratified, it will be premature to enter upon the consid- 
sration of derivative strata until we have considered briefly 
bhe history of the primitive formations. We therefore com- 
mence our inquiry at that most ancient period, lohen there is 
much evidence to render it probable that the entire materials 
Df the globe were in a fluid state, and that the cause of this 

luidity was heat Assuming that the whole 

materials of the globe may have once teen in a fluid state, 
Tom the presence of intense heat, the passage of the first 
jonsoUdated portion of this fluid to a sohd state may have 
been produced by the radiation of heat from the surface into 
space ; the gradual abstraction oi such heat would allow 
the particles of matter to approximate and crystallize ; and 
the first result of this crystallization might have been the for- 
mation of a shell or crust, .... constituting various rocks 
of the granitic series." — Bridgewater Treat., pp. 39, 40. 

" Whence came the materials of the great mass of 
deposits which rest upon the primary gneiss and mica 
schist ? Probably the true answer to this, though we cannot 



192 FALSE THEOKLES OF GEOLOGISTS 

now give adequate proof of it, is that the disintegration of 
granite and other igneous rocks, to which — on what seem 
good grounds — we have akeady ascribed the origin of gneiss 
and mica schist, has been the jprolific source of all these sedi- 
mentary strata. Analysis of the principal rocks of the slaty 
systems does certainly not contradict this view ; which 
neither those who admit with Leibnitz the first solid cover- 
ing of the globe to have been a mass of rocks cooled from 
fusion, or with Lyell that strata added above are melted 
and reabsorbed into granite below, have any reason to 
deny." — Phillips'' s Geology, vol. i. p. 150. 

This view of the primitive earth, which thej make 
the basis of their theory of the formation of the strata 
and inference of the immense age of the world, is 
thus merely supposititious. It is not advanced as an 
ascertained and indubitable fact. It is not even held 
to be susceptible of demonstration. An attempt to 
verify it by " the strictest rules of the Baconian phi- 
losophy" would be regarded by geologists themselves 
as an extravagance. In its highest character it is 
only a conjecture. This consideration overturns, there- 
fore, the deduction that is founded on it respecting 
the long existence of the world. That conclusion can- 
not be established on a mere hypothesis.- It cannot rise 
any higher in certainty than the premise from which 
it is drawn. To build it, moreover, on such a basis, 
is as inconsistent with the principles of geology, as it 
is with the laws of logic ; as they — as was shown in 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 193 

a former chapter — forbid the assumption of any geo- 
logical effect or condition of the earth as a ground of 
induction, that cannot be proved to have actually 
existed. The whole fancy, accordingly, of a scien- 
tific confutation by it of the inspired history of the 
creation, and demonstration that the earth has sub- 
sisted through a vast round of ages, is mistaken. The 
circumstance that the sacred narrative is at variance 
with an undemonstrated and undemonstrable swpjjo- 
sition, is no proof that it is not consistent with fact. 

In the next place, their theory of the formation of 
the granitic world, from which they represent the 
materials of the strata as derived, is altogether gra- 
tuitous also, and in contravention of the laws of mat- 
ter. That theory is, as stated by Dr. Buckland in the 
passage already quoted from him, that the matter of 
the earth was, when created, " in a fluid" or " nebu- 
lous state ;" that is, in the form of gas, " from the 
presence of intense heat ;" and that it was by " the 
radiation of that heat into space" that " the particles" 
were allowed to approximate and crystallize. Mr. 
Macculloch also entertains the same view. 

" The first condition of the earth which has been inferred, 
is that of a gaseous sphere ; while it is my business to state 
that the only evidence for this is derived from the analogy 
OP COMETS, itself rather more inferential than proved, as far 
as the study of these bodies has hitherto proceeded. But it 



194: FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

must also be said, as corroborative of such an inference, that 
the laws of the radiation of heat, and those of chemical com- 
bination, do permit the needful inference that such a sphere 
might or miost finally become a fluid ; or at least a fluid 
globe surrounded by an atmosphere. 

" This, then, is the second presumed condition. And the 
evidence for such a fluid globe is found, first in its statical 
figure, and secondly in the various geological facts already 
reviewed, and founded primarily on the phenomena of volca- 
noes, which prove that the interior of the earth, beyond a 
certain depth, is at present in a fluid condition from the heat 
which was once sufficient for the preceding more extensive 
effects.* 

" And here terminates that which is of most difficult 
investigation in the theory of the earth, and which by many 
loill still he held with hypotheses. The evidence, such as it 
is, is given ; what a rational philosophy will pronounce on it, 
will always deserve attention. . . , 

'' I know of no mode in which the surface of a fluid globe 
could be consolidated, but by the radiation of heat ; while 
of the necessity of such a process I need not again speak. 
The immediate result of this must have been the formation 
of rocks on that surface : and if the interior fluid does now 
produce the several unstratified rocks, the first that were 
formed must have resembled these, if not all. We may not 
unsafely infer that they w^ere granite, perceiving that sub- 

* An assumption not only without proof and against the laws of 
matter, but rejected by a large body of the most eminent geologists 
themselves. 



RESPECTING THE MATEKIALS OF THE STRATA. 195 

stances of this character have been produced wherever the 
cooling appears to have been most gradual. The first appa- 
rently solid globe toas therefore a globe of granite, or of those 
rocks which bear the nearest crystalline analogies to it." — 
Geology, vol. ii., pp. 416, 411. 

Essentially the same views are advanced by Sir H. 
T. De la Becbe. 

But tbis hypothesis is altogether unphilosophical. 
The fusion of matter, or its existence in a gaseous 
form, '-''from the joresence of intense heat^'' which is 
the necessary condition of its assuming that shape, is 
not a natural but an artificial state. It is the result 
of chemical action, and implies therefore a previous 
existence of the matter in a different form. The sup- 
position that the earth was created in that state is a 
self-contradiction, therefore, and at war with the laws 
of matter. It might as well be supposed that the 
world was created with thunderstorms and earth- 
quakes in progress, which imply a previous existence 
of the globe and atmosphere in a different state ; or 
with animals on the point of giving birth to offspring, 
which implies their previous existence. Moreover, 
as the heat that is evolved in the action of chemical 
agents on each other is always previously latent in 
those agents, the supposition of the fusion of the mat- 
ter of the globe by the presence of intense heat, im- 
plies that that heat had previously existed in the mat- 



196 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS. 

ter of tlie globe in a latent state ; and that again im- 
plies that anterior to the development of that heat, 
that matter existed in a different form. It assumes 
also that an immeasm-ably greater quantity of latent 
heat existed in the matter of the globe in its original 
condition than now subsists in it ; and it is implied 
also in the supposition, that beyond that which is now 
latent in the earth, a quantity as much greater as 
would raise the whole of the substances of the globe 
to the most intense fusion and convert them into gas, 
has passed off from it by radiation into the realms of 
space. But that is not only wholly gratuitous and 
infinitely improbable, but is in contravention of the 
principles of geology also, which forbid the assump- 
tion of any geological condition of the earth as a basis 
of induction, that cannot be proved to have actually 
existed ; or any geological effect that cannot have 
resulted from tlie chemical and mechanical forces that 
are now giving birth to changes in the materials 
of the globe. But what can transcend the extrava- 
gance of the fancy that these forces, acting with even 
thousands of times their present intensity, can have 
held all the materials of the globe in a state of fusion ; 
or that all the chemical agents which it contains, in 
any combination that is possible, are adequate to such 
a stupendous effect ? By the supposition, caloric, the 
grand agent of the imagined fusion, has in a great 
degree radiated from the earth into space, so that it 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 197 

no longer exists liere in the force that is requisite to 
that effect. A splendid combination of solecisms for 
the basis of a philosophical theory ! A magnificent 
platform for a scientific confutation of the record God 
has given of the work of creation ! How is it that 
these writers have overlooked a consideration so obvi- 
ous, and that indicates so decisively the nntenable- 
ness of their theory ? 

QUESTIONS. 

What is the object of the discussion commenced in this chapter ? 
Do geologists deduce their inference of the age of the world from 
the strata themselves, or from some theory respecting them ? What 
is the first ground on which they found it ? What is the second ? 
What is the third ? K the facts of geology are not the basis of that 
inference, is it not clear that those facts do not prove it ? In order 
to sustain it, must they not prove, not merely assume or suppose the 
ground from which they deduce it? Will then, proving that the 
postulates from which it is drawn, are mere suppositions, be to con- 
fute its claim to be regarded as a truth scientifically demonstrated ? 
Will showing that their hypotheses are irreconcilable with the facts 
and principles of the science, and the laws of nature, be still more 
effectually to overthrow it? What is the first postulate on which 
they found their deduction of the great age of the world ? State 
some of the forms in which they express their belief that the forces by 
which the strata were constructed, were the same in kind and energy, 
as those which are now acting on the surface of the earth. Are they 
generally agreed on this point ? What is their other postulate ? 
What principal writers maintain that proposition ? State the form 
in which Dr. Buckland expresses it. In what language is it asserted 
by Mr. MaccuUoch ? How is it taught by Sir C. Lyell ? How by 
Mr. Mantell ? Are geologists generally agreed in this doctrine ? Of 



198 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

what did the surface of the primitive earth consist, according to 
these writers ? By what do they hold those supposed granite conti- 
nents were disintegrated ? By what were the particles to which it is 
held they were reduced, borne off to the ocean ? What must geolo- 
gists do, to demonstrate their theory ? Must they prove that it rests 
on indubitable facts ? Or is it enough that it rests on mere hypo- 
theses ? What then is the first objection to their theory respecting 
the sources from which the materials of the strata were drawn? 
Do not geologists attempt to prove their theory? State the 
language in which they present it as a supposition, or hypothesis. 
But if the derivation of the materials of the strata from such conti- 
nents, is merely hypothetical, must not the inference that a vast 
series of ages was occupied in disintegrating those continents, trans- 
porting their detritus to the ocean, and forming the strata from 
them, be merely hypothetical also ? Can an inference from a mere 
imagined fact, have any more reality, or be any more entitled to be 
considered as a demonstrated truth, than the merely imagined fact 
itself is? If there is no certainty that the strata were drawn from 
such a source, how can the supposition that they had such a deriva- 
tion, prove that infinite ages were occupied in their formation? 
Ought not these philosophers who claim that they, alone, are com- 
petent to treat the subject scientifically, to be able to answer this 
question plainly and demonstratively ? 

What is the next objection to their theory of the formation of such 
granite continents? What is the language in which Dr. Buckland 
teaches that the world was created in the form of gas ? What is the 
language in which Mr. Macculloch represents it as originally existing 
in that shape ? Is this proved by them, or merely assumed or sup- 
posed? What is the first objection to it? State some other absurd 
supposition that is parallel to it. Does the supposition that the 
world was created in the form of gas, contradict itself? By implying 
what? What unauthorized assumption does it involve respecting 
the quantity of heat in the globe ? Is that in contradiction to the 
principles of geology, as well as assumed without authority ? 



EESPECTma THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 199 



CHAPTEE IX. 

The False Theories of Geologists respecting the Sources of the Materials of which 
the Strata were formed. 

But geologists are not only forbidden by the laws 
of matter from assuming the existence of such 
granitic continents, islands, and mountains as they 
suppose, anterior to the formation of the strata, but 
they are without any certainty that there were any 
mountains, islands, or continents whatever, that could 
have furnished materials in any considerable measure 
for such vast deposits. This is admitted by Professor 
Phillips. 

*' Whether at the time when all our continents were 
beneath the sea, there were other continents raised above 
it, is a matter which it is difficult to bring fairly within the 
scope of inductive science, except in a very limited form, 
and upon rather doubtful assumptions. The only clear and 
certain evidence of the existence of the land in other situa- 
tions than where it now appears, is to be sought in the 
history of terrestrial organic exuviae imbedded in the earth ; 
the only reasonable presumptive evidence in favor of such a 
doctrine must be founded on mechanical considerations con- 



200 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

nected with the mass and depth of the waters of the ocean. 
To conclude that because continents were raised in one 
quarter, others rrntst have been depressed elsewhere in a 
certain proportion, is inadmissible, because it requires us to 
admit what is perhaps false, viz. that the spaces occupied 
by the solid and liquid parts of the mass of the globe have 
always been exactly and invariably in the same proportion 
to each other as at j)resent. Who can assure us of the 
truth, or even the probability of such a law ?" — Guide to 
olosv, p. 38. 



Sucli is undoubtedly tlie fact. The only certain 
evidence which the strata themselves can furnish of 
the existence of dry land at the period of their forma- 
tion, is the presence in them of fossilized animals and 
vegetables, to the existence of which dry land was 
necessary. The mere fact that the strata were formed 
beneath the v/aters of the ocean is no proof that the 
materials of which they consist were derived from 
continents and mountains, any more than it is that 
they were not. "Eoy is the fact that a portion of their 
materials were probably or certainly drawn from such 
a source, any proof that they all were, any more than 
the fact that some of the waters of the ocean have 
run from mountains and continents is a proof that 
they all originally descended from those sources. 

Mr. Lyell makes the same admission. 

" If asked where the continent was placed, from the ruins 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA. 201 

of which the Wealden strata were derived, we might be 
almost tempted to speculate on the former existence of the 
Atlantis of Plato as true in geology, although fabulous as 
an historical event. We know that the present European 
lands have come into existence almost entirely since the deposi- 
tion of the chalk ; and the same period may have sufficed for 
the disappearance of a continent of equal magnitude situated 
farther west." — LyelVs Principles, vol. ii., p. 458. 

Mr. Macculloch. held that the mountains and conti- 
nents from which the materials of the strata were 
originally derived, preceded those that directly fur- 
nished the elements of the present series. 

" That this system had a beginning we are certain ; where 
that may he, we know not • but for us it is placed beyond 
that era at which we can no longer trace the marks of a 
change of order of the destruction and renovation of its 
form. It is from this point that a theory of the earth must 
at present commence. 

** Hence, then, I have drawn the conclusion that there 
was one terraqueous globe, one earth divided into sea and 
land, even prior to that last named ; containing mountains to 
furnish and an ocean to receive those materials which 
formed the second set of mountains, whose fragments are now 
imbedded in our primary strata, or in those of a third order. 
Geologists may perhaps be startled at conclusions which 
they have hitherto overlooked, obvious as they are, and clear 



202 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

as the reasoning is : how they should not have been seen 
by those who have shown such anxiety to maintain the anti- 
quity of the globe, it is not for me to explain." — Geology, 
vol. i., pp.462, 464-466. 

Yet notwithstanding this fancied proof of the exist- 
ence of at least two sets of mountains and continents 
that were the sources, in succession, of the materials 
of " our primary strata," he yet acknowledges him- 
self unable to decide whether or not those first moun- 
tains were, in a measure at least, identical with those 
that now exist on the globe. 

" In this state of the earth the present primary strata 
occupied horizontal positions beneath this ocean ; though 
we are uncertain whether certain farts of those which we now 
esteem such might not have been the very mountains whence they 
were formed. This is probably the fact, however incapable 
we yet are of proving it, owing to our imperfect observa- 
tions, and the still more imperfect views which geologists 
have hitherto taken of a theory of the earth. We canuot 
conceive that all the supra-marine land which produced the 
primary strata should have been mouldered and transferred 
to the sea before these underwent their first disturbance ; 
nor that it should have all been depressed beneath the sea 
while the new-formed rocks were elevated." — Yol. i., p. 468. 

This extraordinary induction scarcely merits a for- 
mal confutation. A more dim and uncertain argu- 



RESPECTEN-G THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 203 

ment could hardly be made the ground of the vast 
train of consequences he deduces from it. The point 
on which he builds his inference is altogether assumed 
by him, inasmuch as the existence in the strata of the 
fragments of other rocks, is not of itself a proof that 
those fragments were derived from mountains, unless 
it is first established that the materials of such rocks 
cannot have been drawn from any other source ; 
which is the precise point he was to demonstrate. 
This whole imagined induction, indeed from the pro- 
cesses that are now taking place, is, as we shall here- 
after show, a fallacy; inasmuch as the fact that 
minute particles and sands are borne down to the sea 
from the present mountains and plains, which consist 
in a large degree of loose soils, or sedimentary rocks 
that are easily disintegrated, is no evidence that simi- 
lar materials and on much the same scale would have 
been carried down from mountains and plains that 
consisted exclusively of granite. The supposition is 
a solecism, as it implies that the same causes, though 
acting on different materials and in different condi- 
tions, would nevertheless produce precisely the same 
effects. 

Other writers res-ard the mountains and continents 
from which the strata were derived as no longer in 
existence. 

" However incomprehensible it may appear to those who 



204 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

have not studied the subject, geologists entertain no doubt 
that all our present mountains, composed of sedimentary mat- 
ter, were accumulated heneath the sea during countless ages ; 
and, if so, other continents must have existed to furnish 
materials, though no traces of such lands now remain.'^ — 
Sir R. I. Murchisoii's Silurian System, p. 513. 

"It is universally acknowledged among geologists that 
these immense sedimentary deposits could only have accu- 
mulated beneath the waters of the ocean during an incalcu- 
lable period of time, long anterior to the present condition 
of the surface. Now, in order to furnish materials for such 
formations we must conceive of the existence of continents where 
no vestige of them now remains ; from the abrasion and des- 
truction of these, and from the transporting power of river 
and ocean currents, the materials composing them were 
reduced to the state of pebbles, sand, and finely comminuted 
mud, which were widely diffused, and gradually or rapidly 
precipitated upon the ocean bed." — RaWs Geology of West- 
ern New York, p. 521. 

If no trace of those continents now remains, it is 
plainly impossible, from the mere strata themselves, 
to demonstrate that they were in snch positions and 
consisted of such elements, that they can have fur- 
nished the materials from which the strata were 
formed. It is only by assuming the point to be 
proved, that all sedimentary strata must have been 
formed of materials derived from pre-existing moun- 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 205 

tains and dry land, that such a conclusion can be 
obtained. Discard that assumption, and let the ques- 
tion to be determined be, whether the materials of 
stratified rocks must necessarily be derived by disin- 
tegration and transportation from granitic continents 
and mountains, and the error of their argument is 
apparent ; as it is on the assumption that that must 
be their origin that their whole theory is founded. 

Some geologists seem to suppose that a large share 
at least of those materials were derived from the 
mountains that now subsist on the globe. But it is 
shown to be erroneous by the fact that all the great 
ranges, and most of every subordinate class, have 
been thrown up from beneath the ocean since the 
formation of the tertiary, the last great division of 
the strata.*^ 

" If we admit that the primary, the transition, the 
secondary, and the tertiary classes of rock were formed at 

*"If we date the age of granite from the period of the elevation 
of granite mountains we must admit that some granite mountains 
are comparatively recent, for they have been elevated since the 
deposition of the secondary strata. I have shown this to be the case 
with the Bernese and Savoy Alps in my Travels published in 1827. 
In the edition of the present work in 1828, I have shown also, by a 
description and sections, that the elevation of the granite of Savoy 
is more "recent than that of the central part of England. M. Elie de 
Beaumont has since adopted the same views, and has extended fheni 
to other mountain ranges. Professor Sedgwick and Mr. Murchison 
have further proved that a part of the Tyrolean and Bavarian Alps 
was elevated since the deposition of tertiary strata ; for these strata 
are filled up with them to the height of several thousand feet." — 
BakewelVs Geology, p. 101. 



206 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

different successive epochs, and that the lower beds in each 
of these classes are more ancient than the beds that rest 
upon them, it follows as a necessary consequence that the 
elevation of any of these rocks must be dated from a later 
epoch than the period of their formation. The elevation of 
a range of primary or transition mountains, if they are not 
covered by any secondary or tertiary formations, may 
indeed be dated either from an epoch coeval with their 
consolidation, or from any subsequent epoch ; but if they are 
partly covered by secondary or tertiary beds which are 
tilted up with them, we have direct evidence that the date 
of their elevation was posterior to the secondary or tertiary 
epoch." — BakeweWs Geology, p. 101. 

" It is a general law, confirmed by most ample evidence, 
that the interior parts of mountainous regions consist of 
granite and other pyrogenous rocks rising from below all 
the strata, and bearing them up to their present elevations. 
From these elevated points and lines, both the subjacent 
igneous and the superior stratified rocks descend at various 
angles towards the plains and more level regions, beneath 
which they sink and pass at various distances until they 
again emerge in some other mountain group having similar 
characters. In consequence of this arrangement, it happens 
generally that the oldest strata, those which sink deepest 
under the plains, rise highest against the mountain slopes. 

. . . . The most constant of all the facts connected 
with this part of the subject, is the development of granitic 
or some other pyrogenous rocks about the centres of the 
elevated groups from beneath all the strata there occur- 
ring." — Phillips's Guide, p. 31. 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 207 

" Etna would appear to have been the seat of volcanic 
action through a long series of ages, commencing with the 
sufer cretaceous rocks, on which much of the igneous mass is 
now based. 

*' In central France, amid the extinct volcanoes which 
there constitute such a remarkable feature in the physical 
geography of the country, we certainly a;pjproach relative 
dates in some instances. Thus the volcanic mass of the 
Plomb du Cantal appears to have burst through, to have 
upset, and to have fractured the fresh water limestones of 
the Cantal, which, according to Messrs. Lyell and Murchison, 
may be equivalent to the fresh- water deposits of the Paris 
basin, and to those of Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. 

" With regard to the igneous rocks of Auvergne, MM. 
Croiset and Jobert consider that there are about thirty 
beds above the fresh-water limestone, which may be divided 
into four alternations of alluvial detritus and basaltic depos- 
its. Among the beds there are three which contain organic 
remains ; two belong to the third of the ancient alluvions, 
that which succeeded the second epoch of volcanic erup- 
tions ; the third fossiliferous deposit being referable to the 
last epoch of ancient alluvion. 

" The principal ossiferous bed is about nine or ten feet 
thick, and can be traced a considerable distance. . . . The 
fossil species, according to MM. C. and J., are very numer- 
ous, consisting of Elephant, Mastodon, Hippopotamus, Rhi- 
noceros, Tapir, Boar, Felis, Hysena, Bear, Canis, Castor, 
Hare, Water Rat, Deer, and Ox."— IZ. T. De la Beche's 
Manual, pp. 241, 242. 



208 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

"The same phenomena are exhibited in the Alps on a 
much grander scale ; those mountains being composed, in 
some even of their higher regions, of newer secondary for- 
mations, while they are encircled by a great zone of tertiary 
rocks of different ages, both on the southern flanks towards 
the plains of the Po, and on the side of Switzerland and 
Austria, and at their eastern termination towards Styria 
and Hungary. This tertiary zone marks the position of for- 
mer seas or gulfs, like the Adriatic, which were many thou- 
sand feet deep, and wherein masses of strata accumulated, 
some single groups of which seem scarcely inferior in thick- 
ness to the whole of our secondary formations in England. 
These marine tertiary strata have been raised to the height 
of from 2,000 to 4,000 feet, and consist of formations of dif- 
ferent ages, characterized by different assemblages of organ- 
ized fossils, Tht older tertiary groups generally rise to the 
greatest heights, and form interior zones nearest to the cen- 
tral ridges of the Alps. Although we have not yet ascer- 
tained the number of different periods at which the Alps 
gained accessions to their height and width, yet we can 
affirm that the last series of movements occurred when the 
seas were inhabited by many existing species of animals. 

*' The Pyrenees also have acquired the whole of their 
present altitude, which in Mount Perdu exceeds 11,000 
feet, since the deposition of some of the newer or cretaceous 
members of our secondary series." — LyelVs Principles, vol. i., 
p. 139. 

There are similar proofs, also, of the elevation from 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 209 

the ocean of the other great ranges of Europe and 
Asia since the formation of the secondary strata. 

The great mountains of this continent, also, the Ap- 
palachians and Andes, are now universally regarded 
as having been thrown up from the ocean since the 
period of the secondary formations. The Appala- 
chians bear on their tops or sustain on their sides the 
main members of the great series from the Potsdam 
sandstone, the lowest of the fossiliferous rocks on this 
continent, up to the upper division of the carbonife- 
rous group. Deposits of equally late date are found 
also in the lofty ranges of the Andes. 

" I will give a brief sketch of the geology of the several 
parallel lines forming the Cordilleras. Of these lines there 
are two considerably higher than the others ; namely, on the 
Chilian side, the Peuquenes ridge, which, where the road 
crosses it, is 13,210 feet above the sea ; and the Portillo 
ridge on the Mendoza side, which is 14,305 feet. The 
lower beds of the Peuquenes ridge, and of the several great 
lines to the westward of it, are composed of a vast pile 
many thousand feet in thickness of porphyries, which have 
flowed as submarine lava, alternating with angular and 
rounded fragments of the same rocks, thrown out of the sub- 
marine craters. These alternating masses are covered in 
the central parts by a great thickness of red sandstone, con- 
glomerate, and calcareous clay slate, associated with and pass- 
ing into prodigious beds of gypsum. In these upper beds 
shells are toleraily frequent ; and they belong to about the 



210 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

period of the Lower chalk of Europe. It is aa old story, but 
not the less wonderful, to hear of shells which were once 
crawling in the bottom of the sea^ now standing nearly 
14,000 feet above its level. The lower beds ia this great 
pile of strata have been dislocated, baked, crystallized, and 
almost blended together, through the agency of mountain 
masses of a peculiar white soda-granitic rock. 

" The other main line, namely, that of the Portillo, is of 
a totally different formation ; it consists chiefly of grand 
bare pinnacles of a red potash-granite, which low down on 
the western flank are covered by a sandstone, converted by 
the former heat into quartz-rock. On the quartz there rest 
beds of a conglomerate several thousand feet in thickness, 
which have been upheaved by the red granite, and dip at an 
angle of 45° towards the Peuquenes line. I was astonished 
to find that this conglomerate was partly composed of peb- 
bles derived from the rocks, with their fossil shells of the 
Peuquenes range, and partly of red potash-granite, like that 
of Portillo. Hence we must conclude that both the Peu- 
quenes and Portillo ranges were partially ui3heaved and 
exposed to wear and tear, when the conglomerate was 
forming. . . . 

*' Looking at its earliest origin, the red granite seems to 
have been injected on an ancient pre-existing line of white 
granite and mica slate. In most parts, perhaps in all parts 
of the Cordilleras, it may be concluded that each line has 
been formed by repeated upheavals and injections ; and 
that the several parallel lines are of different ages. Only 
thus can we gain time at all sufficient to explain the truly 



RESPECTINa THE MATEEIALS OF THE STRATA. 211 

astonishing amount of denudation which these great, though 
comparatively with most other ranges recent, mountains have 
suffered. 

" The shells in the Peuquenes, or oldest ridge, prove, as 
before remarked, that it has been upraised 14,000 feet since 
a secondary period, which in Europe we are accustomed to 
consider as far from ancient ; but since these shells lived in 
a moderately deep sea, it can be shown that the area now 
occupied by the Cordillera must have subsided several thou- 
sand feet — in northern Chili as much as 6,000 feet — so as 
to have allowed that amount of submarine strata to have 
been heaped up on the bed on which the shells lived." — 
Darwinh Voyage of the Beagle, pp. 319-321. 

"The Uspallata range is separated from the main Cor- 
dillera by a long narrow plain, or basin, like those so often 
mentioned in Chili, but higher, being six thousand feet above 
the sea. This range has nearly the same geographical po- 
sition with respect to the Cordillera which the gigantic Por- 
tillo line has, but it is of a totally different origin ; it con- 
sists of various kinds of submarine lava, alternating with 
volcanic sandstones and other remarkable sedimentary depo- 
sits ; the whole having a very close resemblance to some of 
the tertiary beds on the shores of the Pacific. From this 
resemblance I expected to find silicified wood, which is gene- 
rally characteristic of those formations . I was gratified in a 
very extraordinary manner. In the central part of the 
range, at an elevation of about 7,000 feet, I observed on a 
bare slope some snow-white projecting columns ; these were 
petrified trees, eleven being silicified, and from thirty to 



212 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

forty converted into coarsely-crystallized white calcareous 
spar. They were abruptly broken off, the upright stumps 
projecting a few feet above the ground. The trunks mea- 
sured from three to five feet each in circumference. They 
stood a little way apart from each other, but the whole 
formed one group. Mr. R. Brown, who has examined the 
wood, says it belongs to the fir tribe, partaking of the cha- 
racter of the Araucanian family, but with some curious 
points of af&nity with the yew. The volcanic sandstone in 
which the trees were imbedded, and from the lower part of 
which they must have sprung, had accumulated in successive 
thin layers around their trunks ; and the stone yet retained 
the impression of the bark." — Darwin^ s Voyage of the Beagle, 
pp. 331, 332. 

All the great ranges are tlius of recent origin, and 
tliere are mountains — generally of inferior height, 
and consisting mainly of granite — that were elevated 
at an earlier period, yet none are known that can, 
with any probability, be regarded as having emerged 
from the ocean anterior to the formation of the lower 
groups of the strata. 

'' No truth is more certain or important in geological rea- 
soning, than the formation of all our continents and islands 
by causes acting below the sea. As far as relates to the 
stratified rocks this is obvious ; but it is not the less certain 
for the unstratified rocks, those having undoultedly been up- 
lifted to our vicio from beneath the strata. It is possible there 
may yet be found some granite rocks which were raised 



KESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STKATA. 213 

above the general spherical surface before the production ot 
any deposits from water, and which therefore may be pre- 
sumed to form an exception to this general rule ; but such 
truly primitive rocks have nowhere been seen, nor is there 
any ground of expectation that they will be* discovered/' — 
Phillips's Geology^ vol. ii., p. 248. 

As the most ancient of our present mountains are 
thus of later date than the primary strata, and all the 
principal ranges — like the Alps, the Himalaya, and 
the Andes — were elevated subsequently to the depo- 
sition of the secondary, and even portions of the ter- 
tiary formations, we have the most decisive evidence 
that they were not the sources of the materials from 
which the strata were formed. If their materials 
were derived from mountains and continents, it must 
have been from a different set, of which neither any 
traces remain, nor any indications of the positions 
which they occupied. 

This consideration is thus again fatal to their theory. 
JSTo condition can be more indispensable to its estab- 
lishment, than that it should be shown that contem- 
poraneously with the deposition of the strata, there 
were continents and mountains in existence that 
might have furnished materials for their formation ; 
and in order to that, their position should be deter- 
mined and their dimensions and elevation proved to 
be such as rendered them adequate to the office that 



214 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

is assigned them. To admit that no vestiges of them 
remain, and that there are no means even of deter- 
mining where they were stationed, is to admit that 
the induction that is founded on them is supposititious 
also and without authority. This branch of their 
scheme is thus inconsistent also with the principles 
of geology, which prohibit the assumption of any con- 
dition of the earth as a basis of induction, which can- 
not be proved to have truly existed. 

Let us, however, suppose that precisely such conti- 
nents as they contemplate were in existence, and 
situated in positions the most favorable for the office 
they assign them ; and in place of relieving their 
theory from embarrassment, it only renders its error 
more apparent. 

The average elevation of the present continents 
and islands above the ocean is but a few hundred 
feet. Lake Superior is estimated to be about six 
hundred and forty feet only above that level. Were 
all those portions therefore of the mountains and high 
lands of the continent north of the equator that are 
above the surface of that lake, removed and spread 
over those parts that are below it, they would 
undoubtedly be altogether inadequate to raise them 
to the same height above the sea. On the other 
hand, the strata of the continents are estimated by 
geologists to be on an average not less than six, eight, 
and perhaps even a greater number of miles in depth. 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 215 

Were they removed therefore and thrown into the 
ocean, the granitic basis on which they now rest, 
would be on an average at almost an eqnal depth 
beneath the surface of the sea. It is implied accord- 
ingly that the imagined continents from which the 
materials of those strata are supposed to have been 
drawn, were elevated a corresponding height above 
the ocean. This is distinctly indicated by Maccul- 
loch. 

" The immense deposits of materials which now form tJie 
alluvial tracts of the globe, the enormous masses of second- 
ary strata which have been produced by ancient materials 
of the same nature, all prove the magnitude of the destruction 
which mountains have formerly experienced, which they are 
now daily undergoing. Let imagination replace the plains 
of Hindostan on the Himalaya, or rebuild the mountains 
which furnished the secondary strata of England, and it 
needs not be asked what is the extent of ruin, modern or 
ancient. In this ruin the highest rocks participate most 
largely ; so largely that we can scarcely hope to find one 
portion of that surface which was once most elevated above 
the waters. If in the progress of such extensive destruc- 
tion, thus probably acting on the primary rocks at two dis- 
tinct periods, every vestige of overflowing granite has dis- 
appeared, it is assuredly an event not calculated to excite 
surprise." — Geology, vol. i. p. 154. 

He here speaks as though those deposits were 



216 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

drawn from the present mountains of the globe ; that, 
however, is inconsistent with the views we have 
quoted from him on another page, and is erroneous ; 
as is shown by the proofs we have adduced, that the 
elevation of om- present mountains took place mainly 
since the formation of the principal strata. His 
exemplification, nevertheless, serves to indicate the 
extraordinary height which the theory ascribes to 
those imagined continents. The super-position upon 
England of a mass of granite mountains in height as 
many miles within a fraction above the present sur- 
face, as the under surface of the lowest of its strati- 
fi.ed rocks is below that line, which is reckoned at an 
average of seven, eight, or even ten miles, would give 
the elevation which the corresponding portion of the 
supposed granite continent or island must have pos- 
sessed in order to have furnished the materials of 
those strata. The only deduction required is that of 
the average of the present surface above the level of 
the ocean, which is but a few hundred feet. The 
height of the imagined continent or island must 
accordingly have been far greater than of the loftiest 
present mountains of the earth, or at least six, seven, 
or eight miles. 

On the other hand, on the supposition on which he 
here seems to proceed, that the materials of the strata 
were derived from the present mountains, the bases 
of which they surround, then the super-position on 



RESPECTING- THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 217 

the Himalaya and the table lands on which they rest, 
of an equal area of the strata of the plains of Hindo- 
stan, would give the height which those mountains 
must, according to the theory, originally have pos- 
sessed ; which, if those strata are on an average like 
those of England, six, seven, or eight miles in depth, 
would raise that mountain range to the height of 
eleven, twelve, or thirteen miles. 

Making the most moderate estimate, therefore, of 
those supposed continents and islands, they must 
have soared to a height immensely above the loftiest 
summits of those that are now on the earth. Their 
existence is, accordingly wholly incredible, and 
would have altogether precluded the effect which 
they are employed to explain. For their whole sur- 
face must have towered to such a distance within the 
regions of perpetual congelation as to have been 
buried to a vast depth in snow, on the supposition 
that sufficient vapor to form snow ascended to such a 
height in the atmosphere, and rendered it impossible 
that any considerable streams should have flowed 
from them to bear their loosened particles and bro- 
ken fragments into the surrounding sea; and if no 
vapor ascended to that height, then no water or snow 
could have fallen on them, and thence no rivers 
could have run from them and borne their detritus 
to the ocean. No condition can be imagined pre- 
senting a more absolute barrier to their disintegration 

10 



218 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

and transference to a distant scene. 'No animals or 
vegetables could have lived on sucli frozen lands ; 
and probably no such warmth could have been com- 
municated by the sun to the sea as to have fitted it 
for the existence af animals like those that are buried 
in the strata. "What an extraordinary conception of 
the methods taken by the Almighty Creator to pre- 
pare the world for the residence of man ! "Where in 
the annals of crude and thoughtless speculation can 
a more absurd and monstrous extravagance be found? 
Not to insist, however, on this embarrassing condi- 
tion of their theory ; let us suppose that those fabu- 
lous continents and islands were not of such an incre- 
dible and fatal elevation, but only of the height of 
our present continents, and were diversified like them 
in their surfaces ; and they must still have been wholly 
unsuited to the purpose for which geologists invent 
them; for, consisting exclusively of granite, there 
could not have been any permanent rivers on them 
like those of the present earth, by which their detritus 
could have been borne down to the ocean. No mat- 
ter how much rain fell, no springs like those that 
form our rivers could have risen from their surface ; 
inasmuch as a soil that is permeable by water, strata, 
and strata that are at an angle with the horizon, are in- 
dispensable conditions to the existence of such springs. 
The supposition of water rising through unstratified 
rocks by the force of gravity is a solecism. It is only 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 219 

by 'volcanic forces that water is thrown up from 
beneath the unstratified rocks. Without soils and 
strata, therefore, by which rains could be absorbed 
as they fell, and thence gradually drained again, there 
could be no permanent rivers like those which now 
bear a tide of earthy and vegetable matter from the 
hills and plains to the seas. From such a vast floor 
of impermeable granite the waters, wherever there 
was a descent, would have run as they fell, and the 
rivulets and streams to which they gave rise, vanished 
on the discontinuance of rain. The rains of a mon- 
soon on ranges like the Andes, the Himalaya, or the 
mountains of Abyssinia, instead of saturating the 
surface with a mass of water, which, slowly emerging 
again, should supply permanent streams like the 
Amazon and Orinoco, the Ganges and Indus, the 
Nile and Niger, that roll without intermission to the 
sea, would have swept to the ocean with the rapidity 
of torrents, and immediately left their channels dry, 
till renewed by the return of another season of 
storms. But such torrents and floods acting on the 
surface only at intervals, or during a few days of the 
year, could never have disintegrated such granitic 
masses and borne their ruins to the ocean on a scale 
at all commensurate to the representations of the 
theory. Myriads of ages would have been almost as 
inadequate to such a process as so many days or 
hours. The cause, through whatever period con- 



220 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

tinned, would have been wholly unequal to the effect. 
This consideration, which again evinces the error 
of their views, has been altogether overlooked by 
geologists. jN'otwithstanding they so expressly repre- 
sent the continents to which they refer the materials 
of the strata as consisting exclusively of granite, they 
in fact treat them, in most of their reasonings, as 
though they were covered, like the present mountains 
and plains, with vast masses of loose earth and easily 
disintegrated strata, that were everywhere moistened 
by rains and traversed by streams and rivers, and 
they found their estimate of the rates at which the 
strata were deposited on the quantities of matter that 
are now 'home down the great rivers to the sea, and 
deposited in the deltas at their mouths. 

But the present action of rain and rivers on the 
soil and strata can only be taken as a measure of their 
agency at former periods on surfaces of the same 
kinds. It is no criterion of the action of similar 
volumes of water on continents composed exclusively 
of granite, from which the strata of the present are 
held to be derived. To reason thus, from one world 
to another of a wholly different nature, is an extra- 
ordinary method of establishing a scientific induction 
according to " the strictest rules of the Baconian philo- 
sophy." ^Nearly the whole of their reasoning, accord- 
ingly, on this topic is irrelevant and deceptive. 

They have thus had the misfortune to unite a sin- 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 221 

gular complication of impracticable conditions in 
tlieir theory ; first selecting as the only source from 
which the materials of the strata were derived, conti- 
nents and islands of granite that, from its solid and 
impervious nature, is generally almost insusceptible 
of disintegration by the most powerful agents that act 
on it ; next, elevating those indestructible mountains 
to such a stupendous height that if vapor ever reached 
them, not a drop could descend on them, except in a 
state of the intensest congelation, nor a particle of the 
vast masses of snow, in which they must have become 
enveloped, ever melted, so as to exert its disintegrating 
power on their surface ; and finally, employing only 
occasional and insufficient agents to exert a destroy- 
ing force on their unyielding masses, and only occa- 
sional and transient agents to bear the slight spoils that 
might have been drawn from them to the distant sea ! 
Admirable architects truly of the world ! "Who can 
wonder at the haughty disdain with which so many 
of them are accustomed to repel the criticism of their 
theory by any except of their own profession, as an 
infringement of their rights and an impeachment of 
their infallibility ! 

QUESTIONS. 

Have geologists any certainty of the existence of granite conti- 
nents, like those from which they represent the materials of the strata 
as having been derived ? Does Professor Phillips admit that their 



222 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

existence is merely conjectural, or assumed ? Does the fact that the 
strata were formed beneath the ocean, prove that the materials of 
which they were constructed were drawn from granite continents ? 
Does Sir C. Lyell indicate that he cannot tell where the continent was 
situated from which he supposes some of the strata of Great Britain 
were formed ? Does Mr. Macculloch make a similar admission ? How 
many sets of continents and mountains does he hold have existed on 
the earth? Do other writers maintain that no traces now remain of 
the continents from which they hold the materials of the strata were 
derived ? If no traces of them now remain, is it not clear that there 
are no evidences of their once having existed ? If there are no traces 
of such continents, is it not possible that the strata were derived from 
some other source ? And if they may have been drawn from some 
other quarter, is it not to beg the question to assume that they were 
derived from them ? Do some geologists seem to suppose that a large 
part of the materials of the strata were derived from the present 
mountains of the globe ? What fact proves that supposition to be 
erroneous ? Are most of the present mountains covered in a measure 
with the tertiary or latest great division of the strata ? Is that uni- 
versally admitted by geologists ? Is it true of the Alps, and other 
mountains of Europe ? Cite the proofs of it from Bakewell, Phillips, 
De la Beche, and Lyell. Is it true of the Appalachians and Andes of 
this country ? Cite the proofs of it. Are these great ranges of recent 
origin, compared with the older strata ? Is it held by geologists that 
the ranges of granite instead of being older than the main groups of 
the strata, have been thrown up since the strata were deposited, 
and reached the surface by being driven through them ? Cite the 
testimony of Professor Phillips to that fact. Is it true also of the great 
mountains of Asia as well as of this continent and Europe ? Is not 
the fact that these mountains were not in existence when the strata 
were formed, sufiScient proof that the strata were not constructed of 
detritus drawn from them ? Is not this consideration fatal to their 
theory ? Is not the assumption of the existence of continents and 
mountains of which they have no proof, against their fourth axiom, 



I 



RESPECTINa THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 223 

also, which prohibits their assuming any geological facts, the reality 
of which they are not able to demonstrate? 

But let it be supposed that such continents as they imagine, existed, 
would it in any measure relieve the advocates of the theory 
from their difficulties? Would the height of those mountains be an 
obstacle to their furnishing materials for the strata ? How is it appa- 
rent that they would have been of an immense height ? Must they 
not have continued as long as rivers ran from them and carried down 
materials for the strata, to be at as gr^at an elevation above the 
ocean as the present continents and mountains are ? How else could 
rivers have run from them with sufficient force to carry any amount 
of detritus to the ocean? If then the present strata were drawn from 
them, must they not originally have been as much higher than our 
present continents, as a quantity of materials equal to those of the 
strata, superimposed on them would make them ? As then the strata 
are eight or ten miles in thickness, must not those continents and 
mountains have been eight, ten, twelve, or more miles in elevation? 
But could mountains of such a height have furnished materials for 
the formation of the strata ? Is it sure that vapors would have 
ascended to such a height as to have fallen on them in rain or snow ? 
If snow fell on them, would not the cold that would have reigned 
there have kept them bound in perpetual frost, and prevented the 
disintegration of their surface, and the descent from them of rivers? 
Could any species of either animals or vegetables have subsisted on 
them ? Can a grosser contradiction to the laws of matter and of life 
be imagined, than that the materials of the strata which abound with 
animals and vegetables that were inhabitants of temperate climes, 
were drawn from such frozen regions ? 

" Let it be supposed, however, that those imagiaed continents and 
mountains were no higher than those of the present earth, could they 
then have filled the office which geologists assign them? Why could 
there be no permanent springs and rivers there ? Is there any reason 
to believe that the mere action of the air — changes of temperature 
and occasional moisture, would ever disintei^rate whole continents 



224 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

of solid granite, as hard and impermeable as most of the rocks of 
that kind are which rise to the surface of the earth ? If such granite 
continents could not have been disintegrated, and no permanent 
rivers could have run from them to bear off their detritus, is it not 
clear that they never could have furnished the materials of Avhich the 
strata were formed? Have geologists noticed these difficulties in 
framing their theory ? Have they proceeded in their calculations on 
the assumption that their fancied continents, instead of consisting 
exclusively of granite, v/ere covered with loose soil, like the present 
lands of the globe, and were traversed by numerous permanent streams 
and rivers? Is that legitimate ? Does the fact that some measure 
of mud, sand, and vegetable matter is borne to the sea by the contin- 
ually running rivers of the present globe, which is covered by a deep 
layer of loose earth, and annually shoots up a vast growth of vegeta- 
bles, prove that an equal quantity of similar matter would annually 
be borne to the sea from mere granite continents, which had neither 
any loose earth nor vegetable matter on their surface — nor any rivers 
to bear such materials, if they existed, to the ocean ? Recapitulate 
the several impracticable positions they have thus incorporated ia 
their theory of the origin of the strata. 



EESPECTma THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 225 



CHAPTEE X 



The false Theories of Geologists respecting the Sources of the Materials of which 
the Strata were formed. 



But let us suppose that the chemical and mechan- 
ical agents that may be presumed to have acted on 
those rocky continents would have rapidly disinte- 
grated their surface, and reduced them on a vast 
scale to such minute particles as could have been 
transported by sti*eams to the sea; and their theory 
still continues embarrassed with equally insurmount- 
able difficulties. For they proceed in it on the 
assumption, first, that their whole mass would, during 
the progress of the process, be converted into detritus ; 
and next, that every particle of the detritus produced 
from them would be borne to the sea, and enter into 
the composition of the strata ; as otherwise they must 
have been of a still more enormous height than that 
which is assigned to them. 'As the bulk, which we 
have indicated as ascribed to them by the theory, is 
only equal to that of the strata which are held to 
have been formed from them, if but one third, one 
half, or three quarters of their mass is supposed to 

10* 



226 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

have been transferred to the sea, then they must have 
been of a still greater bulk, in order that that propor- 
tion may correspond to the dimensions of the strata 
that are held to have been built out of their ruins. 
But neither of those conditions is consistent with the 
laws that govern the disintegration of mountains and 
the transportation of their detritus to the ocean. Let 
usj in the first place, suppose the surface of those 
imagined continents to have become disintegrated to 
such a depth that the fragments and levigated parti- 
cles, if spread out on the bottom of the ocean, would 
have formed a stratum of several feet in thickness ; 
and yet no known or conceivable agency of streams, 
torrents, and rivers could have ever conveyed the 
whole, or any considerable portion of them, to the 
sea. The supposition is as inadmissible and prepos- 
terous as the fancy were that the rivulets and streams 
now running, can ever bear to the ocean all the com- 
minuted dust, sand, and gravel with which our present 
continents and islands are overspread. So far from 
achieving such a stupendous result, they would never 
have made any more appreciable progress towards it 
than our present rivers have made in reducing the 
elevation of the continents and diminishing the quan- 
tity of dry land. If they were shaped, like the conti- 
nents of this hemisphere, with a vast range of moun- 
tains running through their whole length along their 
western verge, so that no rains could have fallen on 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 227 

their western slope to bear their debris on that side 
to the ocean ; and if from the foot of that range on 
the east they were spread out like the vast regions of 
South America, that are traversed by the La Plata, 
the Amazon, and the Orinoco, and the immense plains 
and prairies drained in this division of the continent 
by the Mississippi, the St. Lawrence, and the Macken- 
zie, it is obvious that their detritus could never in 
any great quantity have been transported to the 
ocean. ISTinety-nine parts out of a hundred — proba- 
bly nine hundred and ninety-nine out of a thousand — 
would for ever have remained where they fell, as the 
materials that constitute the surface of our present 
continents have continued where they were first 
formed. The rivulets and rivers that are of sufficient 
force to bear particles of earth and sand from their 
places towards the sea, probably do not come in con- 
tact even with one particle in millions of those that 
constitute the soils and debris that are spread on the 
surface. They act only on the narrow line of their 
channels, which, compared to the whole area, are but 
what the lines of longitude marked on an artificial 
globe are to the spaces that lie between them. If 
the supposed continents were formed like Europe, 
with a few lofty ranges, from the bases of which vast 
plains extended like those of the Po, the Rhine, and 
the Danube, or immense levels like those that stretch 
from the Baltic to the Ural Mountains, and the 



228 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

steppes of northern Asia, then also a great share of 
their detritus must for ever have remained where it 
originated; and that would have been still more 
emphatically the fact, if, like Australia, their interior 
through vast spaces was depressed below the level of 
their coasts, so that the waters falling on them could 
have no outlet to the ocean. Whatever might have 
been their forms, therefore, if they corresponded in 
any considerable measure to those of our present con- 
tinents, the transportation of any large quantity of 
detritus from their general surface by torrents and 
rivers must have been wholly impossible. We havo 
in the vast experiment that has been made on our 
present continents for four thousand years, the most 
ample demonstration that streams and rivers are 
altogether inadequate to such an effect. Were all the 
detrital matter that has in that period been boi-ne by 
them from the dry land, and now lies buried beneath 
the seas, restored to the places from which it was 
removed, the largest portion of it would undoubtedly 
be lodged along the line of the streams. The share 
that nine tenths of the surface would receive would 
scarcely be appreciable. 

And next, the conversion of the whole mass of 
those granite continents into detritus — the other con- 
dition of their theory — would be equally impossible. 
For the rate of disintegration and the area on which 
it took place, instead of advancing or continuing the 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 229 

same, would continually decrease in proportion as the 
detritus accumulated on the surface and protected it 
from the action of destructive chemical and mechan- 
ical agents. A thin layer of loam, sand, or gravel, 
would have been a shield against the decrystallizing 
action of the atmosphere and erosion by water. This 
is shown by the fact that granite rocks that have been 
cut and scored by the passage over them, as it is sup- 
posed, of icebergs armed with boulders, and after- 
wards buried by drift, on the removal of the soil with 
which they have been covered, exhibit no indications 
of having undergone disintegration after they had 
received those marks. Many of those, indeed, that 
have been exposed to the action of the elements 
appear unaltered. The grooves ploughed across them 
are as smooth and well defined as they can be 
believed to have been when first made. 

It is shown also by the failure of the most powerful 
streams to produce any important change on the 
height or form of the granite rocks over which they 
have run for thousands of years. Let any one 
examine the granite rocks that in many places lie at 
the bottom of the rapid streams of ISTew England, and 
form the dykes over which they fall, and he will find 
them generally free from any marks of disintegration 
or erosion by the grinding of sand, pebbles, or ice. 
The cavities that are cut where the water rushes down 
rapids or over falls, are caused by the whirl of gravel 



230 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

and pebbles in depressions, not by the mere passage 
of the stream. This is indicated by Humboldt in 
respect to the great cataracts of the Orinoco, formed 
by granite dykes, that have not been worn away, he 
represents, in any perceptible measure by the rush 
of that vast volume of water. 

''When seated on the bank of the Oroonoko, our eyes are 
fixed on those rocky dykes, the mind inquires whether, in 
the lapse of ages, the falls change their form or height. I 
am not much inclined to believe in such effects of the shock 
of water against blocks of granite and in the erosion of 
silicious matter. The holes narrowed towards the bottom, 
the funnels that are discovered in the raudales, as well as 
near so many other cascades in Europe, are owing only 
to the friction of the sand and the movement of quartz 
pebbles 

"We will not deny the action of rivers and running 
waters when they furrow friable ground covered with 
secondary formations. But the granite rocks of Elephantine 
have probably no more changed their absolute height 
during thousands of years than the summits of Mont Blanc 
and of Canigou. When you have closely inspected the 
great scenes of nature in different climates, it is impossible 
not to admit that those deep clefts, those strata raised on 
end, those scattered blocks, those traces of a general con- 
vulsion, are the results of extraordinary causes, very differ- 
ent from those which act slowly on the surface of the globe 
in its present state of tranquillity and repose. What the 



KESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA. 231 

waters carry away from the granite by erosion, what the 
humid atmosphere destroys by its contact with hard and 
undecomposed rocks, almost wholly escapes our perception ; 
and I cannot believe, as some geologists admit, that the 
granitic summits of the Alps and the Pyrenees lower in 
proportion to the accumulation of pebbles in the gullies at 
the foot of the mountains. In the Nile, as well as in the 
Oroonoko, the rapids may diminish their fall, without the 
rocky dykes being perceptibly altered." — Humholdt^s Nar- 
rative, vol. V. pp. 62, 64, 65. 

The supposition, then, that such granitic continents 
could ever be disintegrated, and transported to the 
ocean by the chemical and mechanical agents that 
are now acting on the surface of the earth, is 
altogether untenable. Such indestructible masses 
stretched along the line of the ancient seas could no 
more have furnished the materials of our strata than 
though they had been stationed in another world. 
Geologists themselves could never have advanced 
such an hypothesis had they properly considered the 
impracticable conditions it involves. 

Admitting, however, that those imagined continents 
of granite could have been disintegrated by the 
chemical and mechanical agents to which they would 
have been subjected, and the theory is still embar- 
rassed by the equally fatal objection, that they would 
not even then have furnished the materials of the 
stratified rocks ; inasmuch as some of the most im- 



232 FALSE THEOKIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

portant oi the mineral substances that enter into their 
composition are not constituents of granite, except in 
quantities almost too slight to be appreciable. 

Granite is composed either of quartz, felspar, and 
mica, or quartz, felspar, and hornblende ; and usually 
in the proportion of two parts of quartz, two or three 
of felspar, and one of mica, or hornblende ; and con- 
sists, when mica is an element, of 74 to 75 per cent, 
of silica, 13 to 14 of alumine, 8 or 9 of potash ; and 
four or five other ingredients, amounting together to 
the remaining four or five per cent. The quantity 
of lime is less than half of one per cent., and of iron, 
less than two. When hornblende is an element, the 
potash is diminished one half, the lime increases to 
near fiye per cent., and the iron to near three ; and 
these elements are not promiscuously blended, but 
the quartz, felspar, and mica, or hornblende, are sepa- 
rately crystallized and united in that form in a com- 
pact mass.* On the supposition, then, that such 
mountains and continents of granite could have been 
decry stallized and transferred to the bed of the ocean, 
they could not have contributed to the formation of 
any strata except those of which silica and alumine 
are the constituents ; that is, gneiss, quartz rock, 
sandstones, shales, and sand and gravel. They could 
have furnished nothing, except on a scale too insig- 

* Phillips's Geology, vol. ii., pp. 65, 66. 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 233 

nificant to merit consideration, towards the structure 
of tlie vast beds of limestone, iron, chalk, salt, and 
several other important deposits. 

The theory thus fails again to fill the office for 
which it is devised, and on a vast scale. Grant them 
all that it can yield, exhaust its utmost resources, and 
instead of supplying, as it professes, the whole of the 
materials of which the strata are constituted, it can 
only furnish from one-half to two-thirds. How fatal 
to their system this defect is, is seen from the fact 
that limestone, to the formation of which it could con- 
tribute nothing, occurs among the lowest of the stra- 
tified rocks, and alternates either with sandstones, 
shales, or coal, throughout the whole series of the 
primary, secondary, and tertiary groups, extends over 
immense areas, and is often of great depth. 

" One of the most remarkable geological features of this 
continent is the vast extent of the carboniferous limestone. 
I have traced its eastern border — conforming to the course 
of the other mineral formations east of the Mississippi — 
more than one thousand miles running to the west of south, 
from the State of New York to the thirty-fifth degree of 
north latitude in the State of Alabama ; the course is there 
changed, and lies to the north of west, leaving Little Rock 
on the Arkansas about thirty miles to the south, and disap- 
pearing between five and six hundred miles from the Rocky 
Mountains. This deposit extends uninterruptedly a geo- 
graphical distance of at least 1,500 miles from east to west ; 



234: 



FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 



underlying portions of the states of New York, Pennsylva- 
nia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, and the territory of 
Arkansas on that line. In Tennessee, Kentucky, Yirginia, 
and Maryland, it is bounded by a line of which the Cumber- 
land Mountains form a part. In the plains through which 
the Mississippi flows, and which include the Illinois prairies, 
it appears like a continuous floor, forming an almost unva- 
rying flat." — FeatherstonhaugK s Geological Report, 1835, 
pp. 21, 28. 



Of the aggregate of the several layers in the carbo- 
niferous group, the following section of the upper coal 
series in Western Yirginia may be taken as an exam- 
ple: . 



First or 


lower bed 


Second, 


a 


Third, 


(( 


Fourth, 


a 


Fifth, 


<< 


Sixth, 


« 


Seventh, 


« 


Eighth, 


it 


Ninth, 


li 



12 feet inches. 



6 


» 4 


ii 


3 


" 


(( 


1 


" 6 


<( 


6 


" 6 


« 


2 


'' 


a 


7 


" 6 


a 


7 


" 


it 


5 


'-' 


u 


50 


' 10 


it 



Making a total thickness of limestone in this group along 
the line of section of fifty feet ; adding to these twenty-four 
in the lower shale and sandstone group, and three in the 
lower coal group, and we have in the whole extent of the 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 235 

coal measures embraced in the section, a thickness of about 
seventy-seven feet of limestone." — Rodgers^s Repori on the 
Geology of Virginia, 1839, p. 93. 

The inadequacy of their theory to account for this 
important portion of the strata, though seen and 
acknowledged by geologists, has not led them either 
to abandon or modify it. Some candidly confess 
themselves unable to give a satisfactory explanation 
of its origin ; while Macculloch, Phillips, and some 
others, maintain, as the most probable hypothesis, 
that it was formed of the exuvise of testaceous ani- 
mals, and was drawn originally by them from the 
waters of the sea. But that, besides being a. mere 
conjecture and infinitely improbable, furnishes no 
indication of its original source ; as it implies either 
that the lime w^as previously held in solution in the 
waters of the sea — which was impossible, as the quan- 
tity is such as would have thickened all the waters 
of the globe to a paste — or else that it was gradually 
introduced into them from some unknown source, 
which is no explanation whatever of its origin. In- 
stead, therefore, of demonstrating their hypothesis 
that the whole of the materials of the strata w^ere 
drawn from their fabled mountains of granite, by 
their own concession that large portion of them that 
consists of limestone was of a different deriva- 
tion. Those vast formations, accordingly, inter- 



236 FALSE THEOKIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

spersed throiigli the whole mass of the strata, are so 
many monuments of the error of their theory. 

Iron, also, which enters very largely into the com- 
position of many of the strata, especially of the car- 
boniferous groups, cannot have resulted from the de- 
composition of granite, but must have been altogether 
drawn, from some other source. Besides, indeed, 
those rocks which imbed it in masses and derive from 
it their principal character, it exists in ordinary sand- 
stones, and shales consisting mainly, like granite, of 
silica and alumine, in far greater portions than in 
that rock. 

So, also — to say nothing of chalk — of the vast beds 
of salt. The nature of that mineral forbids the sup- 
position that it can have resulted from the disintegra- 
tion of granite; as there is no such element in its 
composition. 

The theory thus fails to make any provision for the 
formation of at least one-third of the strata for which 
it professes to account by a scientific induction accord- 
ing to " the strictest rules of the Baconian philoso- 
phy." Can higher evidence be asked of its utter 
erroneousness ? Yet its authors, though aware that 
it is thus incommensurate to the vast task which they 
assign to it, seem not to regard its failure on so im- 
mense a scale as a proof of its inaccuracy, or reason 
for its abandonment. They continue to make it the 
basis of their arguments for the vast age of the world, 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 237 

and treat the inference they found on it as a scientific 
induction. 

Unfortunately, however, for the theory, this defect 
does not terminate at that point. It, in fact, fails as 
entirely to account for those strata of which silicious 
sand is the principal element, as for those which con- 
sist of limestone, iron, and salt ; for though the main 
materials of sandstone are those of which granite con- 
sists, silica and alumine, yet the form in which they 
now exist demonstrates that they cannot have been 
derived from that rock. In granite those elements, 
with a slight mixture of potash, iron, and lime, are 
combined in three different proportions in crystals of 
quartz, felspar, and mica, or hornblende ; but in sand- 
stone they are not in the form of quartz, felspar, and 
hornblende, or mica crystals, as the first three would 
undoubtedly have been, at least in a chief degree, 
had they been drawn from granite. ITor are they 
crystallized ; but instead, are, at least mainly, of a 
mere granular structure, or formed by an aggregation 
of particles by a law essentially unlike that of crystal- 
lization. The nature and importance of the distinction 
in structure and form that exists between them — the 
crystals of granite being geometric, though imperfect, 
but the particles of sandstone generally simple grains 
or comminuted mud — may be seen from the following 
passage : 

"Quartz is crystallized in double six-sided pyramids in the 



238 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

substance of granitic, porphyritic, and other igneous rocks ; 
in six-sided prisms terminated by six-sided pyramids in mine- 
ral veins and in cavities in granite ; compact in veins ; nodu- 
lar in amygdaloidal traps ; rolled masses in old red conglo- 
merate millstone grit, and grauwacke ; worn grains in sand- 
stones, clays, certain quartz rocks, and coarse clay slates. 

"Felspar; primary rhomboidal crystals in granite, por- 
phyry, trachyte, and basalt ; composite crystals in cavities 
of granite and veins ; disturbed crystals in gneiss ; rolled 
crystals in conglomerate ; decomposed or porcelain clay in 
some granites and sandstones. 

" Mica, crystallized in hexagonal plates in granite, por- 
phyry, lava, and primary limestone ; disturbed crystals in 
gneiss and mica schist ; fragmentary scales in sandstone, sand, 
shale, and clay. 

" Hornblende, crystallized with felspar in granite, green- 
stone, basalt, and lava, also in hornblende slate." — Phillips's 
Guide, p. t9. 

In granite, quartz has thus a geometric shape, but 
in sandstone it is in the form of minute particles or 
grains. The Potsdam Calciferous and Medina sand- 
stones, for example, of this State, generally exhibit no 
traces in any of their parts of a crystalline structure, 
but are formed by a mere aggregation of minute par- 
ticles, and, on being broken, are easily reduced to the 
most attenuated granules or dust. They are never- 
theless usually represented by geologists as drawn 
wholly from granite, and as owing their new shape 



BESPECTING THE MATPJ RIALS OF THE STRATA. 239 

to the fracture, rolling, or abrasure of the crystals, 
of which they originally formed a part. 

"Take for example the very common rock sandstone ; its 
component grains of quartz, felspar, and mica, are more or 
less rolled OT fragmented crjstsds of these substances, derived 
from rocks like gneiss, mica, schist, &c., which are also com- 
posed of grains of the same kinds, less affected by mechan- 
ical processes ; or from granite, porphyry, &c., which are 
purely crystalline rocks. Such derivative sandstones are 
formed at tliis day from such crystallized granite and other 
rocks." — Phillijps's Geology, vol. i. p. 31. 

" In a general sense, the red sandstone must be considered 
as formed of fragments, more or less minute, of preceding 
rocks or minerals. When these are of the usual size of 
sand, the finer sandstones are produced ; when larger, the 
results are coarser gritstones and conglomerates, or breccias. 
The term sandstone is, however, equally applied to the 
whole, although rather in a geological than in a mineralo- 
gical sense." — Maccullock's G. C. of Rocks, p. 402. 

In the first place, however, this transformation 
from crystals to grains is not demonstrated. The 
mere fact that the particles of sandstone consist of 
the same elements as the quartz crystals of granite, 
is no proof that they were derived from that rock, 
any more than the fact that the elements of granite 
are essentially the same as gneiss and the primary 
shales and sandstones is proof that that rock was — 



240 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

according to the hypothesis proposed by Sir C. Lyell 
— ^formed from them. Yet the theory has no other 
ground for its support than the mere similarity of 
their elements. 

In the next place, it is inexplicable, on the suppo- 
sition that they had their origin in granite, that no 
traces remain in them of the crystals from which 
they were drawn. Crystallized quartz, even in the 
state in which it usually exists in granite, is an ex- 
tremely hard, and under the action of the chemical 
and mechanical agents to which it is ordinarily 
exposed, almost indestructible mineral. That vast 
mountains, that whole continents towering several 
miles into the atmosphere, and consisting largely of 
that element, should have been dissolved and reduced 
in a great measure to the most comminuted particles 
by the mere chemical and mechanical forces that are 
now acting on the surface of the globe, may justly be 
pronounced a physical impossibility. No effect can 
be conceived more obviously and absolutely beyond 
the powers of those agents. 

1^0 mode of the production of such a change can 
be suggested that does not leave the theory embar- 
rassed with this insuperable objection. To suppose 
the quartz and other crystals in granite to have been 
subjected to a chemical solution, were first to assume 
that there were chemical forces then in activity of 
immeasurably greater energy, and operating on a far 



EESPECTma THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 241 

wider area, than there now are on the globe. But 
that is prohibited by the maxims of geology, which 
require that if the solution of granite mountains and 
continents is to be accounted for, it should be by 
forces the same in kind and intensity as those that 
are now exerting their powers on the earth, l^ext, 
if they are supposed to have undergone a solution, 
then their assumption of their present granular form 
must have been the effect of a different and peculiar 
chemical agency. But that is again forbidden by the 
principles of geology. As no chemical agents are 
now in activity that generate such silicious grains 
and aggregations of grains as those that constitute 
the Potsdam, Calciferous, Medina, and other sand- 
stones, it cannot, according to the maxims of the 
science, be assumed that they existed and acted at 
a former period. 

The supposition that they were reduced from 
crystals to their present granular forms — spherical, 
irregularly rounded, and angular — by mechanical 
forces, abrading or fracturing them, is embarrassed 
by equally formidable difficulties. It is altogether 
incredible that any mechanical force — as of the 
waves of the ocean, or the current of rivers — should 
have acted on every j)oint of vast mountains and 
continents so as to have broken, worn, and disinte- 
grated their whole mass. It is equally incredible 
that such agents, acting wherever they might, should 

11 



24:2 FAXSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

have reduced the silicious elements universally of 
the masses with which they came in contact, to 
grains of such a minute and uniform size. 'No result 
can be conceived more wholly without the limits of 
possibility than that such causes acting with indefi- 
nitely varying forces on rocks differing widely in 
their solidity, should give birth to such extraordinary 
effects, and in such unvarying uniformity. ISTo such 
results spring from their present action. The sup- 
position is, therefore, as absolutely prohibited as the 
others, by the principles of geology. 

"We might extend this argument to arenaceous 
shales, granular quartz, the conglomerates of which 
silicious pebbles are a principal element, and ordi- 
nary sand and gravel. Instead of crystals, they are 
aggregates of grains, or concretions of minute parti- 
cles by a law wholly unlike that of geometric 
crystallization. The theory thus fails as entirely to 
account for these vast formations as for those that 
consist of ingredients wholly unlike those of granite. 

These considerations thus furnish the most resist- 
less demonstration of its error. "Whatever else may 
be thought to have been susceptible of derivation 
from such continents of granite, — the vast beds of 
gravel, sand, salt, chalk, limestone, and sandstone, 
cannot have been drawn from that source. Their 
nature, or the forms in which they exist, make the 
supposition a paradox. The most indisputable proofs 
are graven on their fronts that that was not their 



KESPECTrNG THE MATEEIALS OF THE STRATA. 243 

origin. But witlidrawiiig these, there is nothing left 
through the whole mass of the fossiliferons rocks — • 
even granting that all the other insuperable obstacles 
to the theory could be overcome — which its advo- 
cates can refer to those fabulous continents, except 
certain conglomerates and those shales and clays of 
which alumine is a chief ingredient ; a slender basis 
truly, could they verify their hypothesis in respect to 
them, on which to erect a demonstration of the 
immeasurable age of the world ! Can a more unfor- 
tunate predicament be imagined of writers who have 
indulged so confident a persuasion that they had 
established their system by evidence scarcely inferior 
in certainty to that of mathematics ? 

Passing over, however, all these insurmountable 
objections to their theory, let us suppose their ima- 
gined continents reduced in any requisite measure to 
disintegration, transformed into sand, gravel, and peb- 
bles, and traversed by streams and rivers of sufficient 
size and force to bear such materials to the sea ; and 
there still would be no agent by which they could be 
spread out on the bottom of the deep over the vast 
spaces that are occupied by many of the strata. The 
larger streams, like the Ganges, Indus, Mle, Niger, 
Amazon, Mississippi, and St. Lawrence, would carry 
no gravel or sand whatever to the ocean. These 
great rivers deposit all the heavier particles with 
which they are charged, in their first stages, hundreds 



24:4: FAXSE THEOEEES OF GEOLOGISTS 

of miles before they reach their mouths, and bear 
nothing to the ocean but comminuted mud and vege- 
table matter that is held in solution ; and that they 
throw down almost immediately on reaching the sea. 
'No portion of it, probably, is carried beyond the lines 
at which their cm-rents are arrested by the resistance 
of the waters of the ocean: and that is within a 
very narrow circle, compared to the vast spaces that 
lie beyond. The result accordingly of their trans- 
porting agency is, simply, at first slowly to diminish 
the depth of the ocean at their mouths, and finally, 
gradually to extend the dry land at those points into 
the sea. Their influence is exhausted in the forma- 
tion of their deltas. The main bed of the ocean is as 
completely unafiected by them as though they were 
not in existence. Their limited power and the narrow 
sphere within which their agency is circumscribed, 
forbid the supposition that such rivers can have 
been the instruments of conveying to the ocean the 
materials of which the strata are constituted. The 
area over which many of the strata extend is immense. 
Gneiss is generally considered as one of the most uni- 
versal of the rocks, and lies very generally, it is held, 
between the granite which is the fundamental rock, 
and the fossiliferous strata. The fossiliferous strata in 
some of their divisions exist everywhere, except in 
the narrow spaces in which either granite, or some of 
the lowest orders of the stratified rocks, rise to the 



RESPECTma THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 245 

surface. In this country the E"ew York or Silurian 
system, extending from the lowest of the fossiliferous 
rocks up to the old red sandstone, and comprising a 
vast series of sandstones, limestones, and shales, 
spreads in some of its divisions from the eastern range 
of the Appalachians to Lake Superior^ and from Lake 
Champlain to the Rocky Mountains, and forming a 
bed on an average many thousand feet, and in places 
probably several miles in thickness. The fancy that 
that vast mass of matter can have been borne there, 
and distributed in so equable a manner by rivers, is 
an extravagance at which common sense revolts. It 
is only matched in its disregard of probability, by the 
hypothesis that the limestone and chalk formations 
are the product of testaceous animals elaborated by 
them from other matter, of which lime is not in any 
appreciable measure a constituent. The effect, in the 
conditions that are supposed, lies wholly out of the 
Sphere of possibility. It might as well be imagined 
that the granite mountains themselves that rise from 
beneath these strata and rear their naked summits 
into the sky, were floated in solid masses by streams 
or tides from those fabled continents, and planted in 
their present positions. The cause is infinitely dis- 
proportioned to the task that is assigned it. It has 
none of the qualities that are requisite to the produc- 
tion of such an effect. 

Sir C. Lyell, however, notwithstanding he admits 



246 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

that all the heavy matter borne down by a river must 
fall to the bottom almost immediately on its entering 
the sea, still maintains that the stream naturally ad- 
vances the line of its deposits further into the deep, 
and that the change of the area, by that cause, on 
v^hich its sediment is thrown down, and a transferrence 
of the river itself to a new line and point of debouch- 
ure by the elevation or inclination of the continent 
from which it descends, will sufficiently account for 
the distribution of the detritus out of which he holds 
the strata were formed, over the area which they 
occupy. 

"It is only by carefully considering the combined action 
of all the causes of change now in operation, whether in 
the animate or inanimate world, that we can hope to ex- 
plain such complicated appearances as are exhibited in the 
general arrangement of mineral masses. 

" The surface of the terraqueous globe may be divided 
into two parts, one of which is undergoing repairs, while the 
other, constituting, at any one period, by far the larger por- 
tion of the whole, is either suffering degradation, or remain- 
ing stationary without loss or increment. The dry land is 
for the most part wasting by the action of rain, rivers, and 
torrents ; and part of the bed of the sea is exposed to the 
excavating action of currents, while the. greater jpart, remote 
from continents and islands, receives no new deposits. For as 
a turbid river throws down all its sediment into the first lake 
which it traverses, so currents flowing from land or from 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 24Y 

shoals purge themselves from foreign ingredieats in the first 
deep basin which they enter, and beyond this the blue waters of 
the ocean may for ages remain dear to the greatest depths. 

"The other part of the terraqueous surface is the recep- 
tacle of new deposits, and in this portion alone the remains 
of plants and animals become fossilized. Now the position 
of this area, where new formations are in progress, and where 
alone any memorials of the state of organic life are pre- 
served, is always varying, and must for ever continue to vary ; 
and for the same reason that portion of the terraqueous globe, 
which is undergoing waste also shifts its position ; and those 
fluctuations depend partly on the action of aqueous and 
partly on igneous causes. 

" In illustration of these positions I now observe that the 
sediment of the Khone, which is thrown into the Lake of 
Geneva, is now conveyed to a spot a mile and a half distant 
from that where it accumulated in the tenth century, and 
sis miles from the point where the Delta began originally 
to form. We may look forward to the period when the 
Lake will be filled up, and then a sudden change will take 
place in the distribution of the transported matter ; for the 
mud and sand brought down from the Alps will thenceforth 
be carried nearly two hundred miles southwards, where the 
Rhone enters the Mediterranean.'- — Principles of Geology, 
vol. ii. pp. 210, 211.. 

JSTo river, however, nor rivers could ever, by that 
process, spread a layer of pebbles, sand, or the most 
comminuted mud over the whole bed of a spacious 



248 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

sea; nor bear any appreciable quantity of matter 
more than a very short distance within the deep. 
The current of a river on entering the sea, whether 
the waters of the deep are stationary, or in motion on 
a line that is transverse to that current, must meet a 
resistance that instantly checks its rapidity, and soon 
puts an end to its progress. All the matter accord- 
ingly borne forward by its impulse, or held in solu- 
tion, must necessarily be deposited in the area within 
which it is circumscribed, l^ot a particle can ever 
be carried out of that limit, except by a movement 
of the waters of the sea that is independent of the 
river. It is demonstrable, therefore, that the detritus 
carried down by a river cannot be spread over the 
whole of the bed of an ocean, or spacious sea ; inas- 
much as it would require thiat the current of the river 
should extend over the whole of the area, and dis- 
place the whole mass of the waters of the ocean, or 
sea, which is as much out of the circle of possibility 
as it is that it should transport the solid strata them- 
selves by its current. This part of Sir C. LyelFs 
theory, therefore, furnishes no solution of the diffusion 
over the bed of the ocean of the materials of which 
the strata are formed. 

His supposition that it could be produced by a 
change of the position of the continents from which 
it is supposed to be drawn, causing a transferrence of 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA. 249 

the rivers to new lines and points of debouchure, is 
equally untenable. 

" On the other band, if a current charged with sediment 
vary its course — a circumstance which must happen to all 
of them in the lapse of ages — the accumulation of trans- 
ported matter will at once cease in one region, and com- 
mence in another, 

"Although the causes which occasion the transferrence of 
the places of sedimentary depositions are continually in 
action in every region, yet they are particularly influential 
where subterranean movements alter from time to time the 
levels of land ; and their effect must be very great during 
the , successive elevations and depressions which must be 
supposed to accompany the rise of a great continent from 
the deep. A trifling change of level may sometimes throw 
a current into a new direction, or alter the course of a 
considerable river. Some tracts will be submerged and 
laid dry by subterranean movements ; in one place a shoal 
will be formed, whereby the waters will drift matter over 
spaces where they once threw down their burden, and new 
cavities will elsewhere be produced both marine and lacus- 
trine which will intercept the waters bearing sediment, and 
thereby stop the supply once carried to some distant basin. 

"Without entering into more detailed explanations, the 
reader will perceive that according to the laws now govern- 
ing the aqueous and igneous causes, distinct deposits must 
at different periods be thrown down on various parts of the 
earth's surface, and that in the course of ages the same 

11* 



250 FALSE THE0EIE8 OF GEOLOGISTS 

area may be again and again the receptacle of such dissimi- 
lar sets of strata." — Frinciples of Geology, vol. ii. p. 212. 

But this does not account any more than the other 
for the diffusion of the materials of any one of the 
strata over the whole bed of the ocean ; it only indi- 
cates a mode in which the points where rivers enter 
the sea may be changed from time to time so as to 
produce a change of the areas at the margin of the 
ocean, where the sediment borne down by them shall 
be deposited. It leaves all the other parts of the 
bottom of the sea as unprovided as they were before, 
with materials for the formation of new strata. In 
order to explain their deposition over the whole bed 
of the ocean by such a cause, it would be necessary to 
suppose, not only that the continents from which 
the materials of the strata were derived, but that small 
divisions of the bottom of the sea itself, also, were suc- 
cessively elevated, so that the river should in succes- 
sion enter it at as many points as would be requisite, 
in order to the deposition of a stratum over its whole 
area. That, however, cannot have happened ; inas- 
much as the elevation and depression of the surface 
in detached parts that must then have taken place at 
the formation of each layer of the system, would have 
broken their whole mass into fragments, and reduced 
them to a promiscuous heap of ruins. But they have 
suffered no such violence. The New York or Silu- 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 251 

riaii groups whicli underlie the whole country from 
the Alleghanies far into the Canadas, and from Yer- 
mont beyond the Mississippi, are but slightly dislo- 
cated. Throughout a large part of their immense 
area they lie at a dead level, or moderate inclination, 
and have never been seriously disturbed in any of 
their members since their deposition. It is clear then 
beyond debate, that their materials were never trans- 
ported to their several places by the action of rivers. 
The supposition is indeed so palpably at war with the 
laws that govern their agency, and so absurd and 
enormous an extravagance, as to render it surprising 
that considerate persons should have ever entertained 
it, and made it the basis of an argument for the 
immeasurable age of the world. 

And finally, in addition to all these evidences of 
the error of their theory, the distribution of the ele- 
ments, silex, alumine, and lime, of which the forma- 
tions chiefly consist, into separate strata, is an equally 
decisive proof that they cannot have been drawn from 
such pre-existing continents, nor been borne to their 
several places and arranged in their positions by the 
agency of streams, rivers, and currents. The detritus 
that is wafted down by rivers to the sea, is not separa- 
ted, on its deposition, according to the species of 
which it consists, and its different ingredients thrown 
down on different areas. Instead, they fall together 
and form ?i promiscuous mass. The only separation 



252 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

that takes place, is of tliS heavier from the lighter 
grains and particles — gravel falling first, sand next, 
then comminuted mud, and last, light vegetable par- 
ticles ; and as their fall takes place by the force of 
gravity, the points at which they severally descend 
are determined by their weight, not by the material 
of which they consist. 

The strata, however, were not formed in that man- 
ner, but their great elements were distributed into 
separate layers ; sandstone, sand, and gravel, of which 
silex is the chief ingredient, being arranged by them- 
selves ; slate, marl, and clay, which owe their princi- 
pal character to alumine, forming a different set of 
layers ; and limestone and chalk, of which lime is the 
great ingredient, constituting beds and masses by 
themselves. The sand, gravel, and pebbles, moreover, 
that enter into.the composition of many of their layers, 
instead of being sorted according to size and weight 
so that they regularly decrease in dimensions in one 
direction, and increase in the other, as in the deltas 
of rivers, are distributed indiscriminately throughout 
the spaces — sometimes of vast extent — which they 
occupy. Tims the sandstones of the 'New York sys- 
tem stretching, there is reason to believe, from Yer- 
mont to the Eocky Mountains, and from the Appa- 
lachians far into the Canadas, do not vary in the 
coarseness of their grains and pebbles in any ratio to 
their distance from their eastern, western, southern, 



KESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 253 

or northern edges, or from any interior points in the 
area over which they are spread. l!^or do those of 
the carboniferous system, which extend from the 
Alleghanies through the western parts of Pennsylva- 
nia and Yirginia, the southern part of Ohio, and a 
large share of Kentucky, Indiana, and Illinois. Their 
variations, if they vary, are obviously from chemical, 
not from mechanical or geographical reasons. 

These facts form, therefore, the most unanswerable 
demonstration, in the first place, that the materials of 
the strata were not derived, as the theory represents, 
from disintegrated continents of granite — as they 
could not then have been assorted as they are, and 
their several elements ' arranged in layers by them- 
selves ; and in the next place, that the distribution 
throughout their whole extent, of the sand and gravel 
that enter into the composition of sandstones and 
other strata, were not transported in their present 
form from a distance to their places, by the action of 
streams and currents. 

Such are the proofs of the error of this extraordi- 
nary theory, which refers the materials of the strati- 
fied rocks to anterior continents and islands of granite. 
There is not a solitary step in the process which it 
contemplates at which it is not confuted by a palpa- 
ble contradiction to the laws of the physical world, 
and the principles of geology. The supposition with 
which it commences of the creation of the earth in a 



254: FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS^ 

state of gaseous fusion, is a paradox. There are no 
indications where the continents and mountains were 
stationed, from the ruins of which it is held the strata 
were formed. Had there been such continents and 
mountains as the hypothesis implies, they must have 
been of such an elevation as to have been protected 
by congelation from being disintegrated and trans- 
ported to the sea by the action of water. Had they 
been depressed into a temperate region, still no 
springs could have emerged from their surface, nor 
permanent streams and rivers descended from them to 
the sea. Had they been disintegrated and traversed 
by streams and rivers, they could never have borne 
more than an inconsiderable portion of their detritus 
to the ocean. Had their detritus been transported to 
the sea, it could not have been transformed into sand, 
gravel, and pebbles : it could not have been spread 
over the bed of the ocean : it could not have been 
assorted according to the materials of which it con- 
sists, and formed into separate layers of sandstone, 
limestone, and shale. There is not one of these pro- 
cesses through which the theory represents the mate- 
rials of the strata as having passed, that is not in con- 
tradiction to the laws of tlie physical world, and an 
infinite impossibility. The demonstration is absolute, 
therefore, that the strata cannot have been formed by 
these processes, and that the whole theory is ground- 
less and mistaken. The inference accordingly that" is 



RESPECTING THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA. 255 

founded on it of tlie vast age of the world, is equally 
un^^hilosophical and false. 

QUESTIONS. 

Suppose that chemical agents could have acted on those conti- 
nents, and produced a rapid disintegration, is it credible that it 
could have gone to the extent the theory assumes ? What are the 
two conditions which that implies ? Is either of them consistent with 
the laws of matter ? If those continents became covered with a soil, 
is it not as incredible that streams should have borne it all to the 
ocean, as it is that the streams of the present continents should bear all 
the earth and gravel of the regions from which they run to the sea ? 
Is there any reason to suppose that a millionth part of the detritus 
of the Andes ever reaches the ocean ? Does it not, with the excep- 
tion of comparatively few particles, lodge near the foot of the ranges 
from which it is disintegrated ? Does not all but the merest fraction 
of the debris of the Rocky Mountains remain where, or near where, 
it first falls ? Could the other condition which they assume have been 
realized ? Give the first reason that it could not. Give the second 
reason. What does Humboldt state in regard to the inadequacy of 
rivers to wear away the rocks over which they pass ? Is it clear then 
that continents of granite could never have been converted into sand 
and dust, and transported to the ocean by the chemical and mecha- 
nical agents that are now acting on the earth's surface ? 

But could those gi-anite continents have been reduced to dust, 
would they have furnished the various substances of which the strata 
consist ? Of what is granite composed ? What are the proportions 
in which these elements exist in it ? What are the only strata that 
might have been formed out of those elements ? What other strata 
are there of which they could not have furnished the principal ingre- 
dient ? What proportion of the strata then must have been derived 
from some other source ? By what formation is this exemplified in 
this country ? Is limestone spread over vast regions ? What aggre- 



256 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

gate thickness do its several beds in a single group sometimes attain? 
Are geologists aware that these immense deposits of lime cannot be 
accounted for on their theory ? What other substances are there that 
enter into the composition of the strata, that cannot have been deri- 
ved from granite? Do these facts confute their theory? Does it 
fail also to account for those strata, such as sandstone, that consist 
of substances that exist in granite ? State the reason. What is the 
difference of the form of quartz in granite and sandstone ? Is the 
assumption of geologists that the crystals of granite have been 
changed into the granules of sandstone, admissible ? What is the first 
reason against it ? What is the second ? Can such a change have 
been produced by chemical agents ? Can it by mechanical forces ? 
What other classes of strata are there that cannot, for the same rea- 
son, have been derived from granite ? Does the theory then fail to 
account for all but an inconsiderable portion of the strata ? 

Suppose, however, those difficulties were overcome, and that rivers 
could have borne down a large quantity of detritus to the sea ; could 
they have spread it over vast areas of the bottom of the ocean ? Do 
the great rivers of the present earth carry the earthy matter with 
which they are charged more than a short distance into the sea ? Is 
it not a law that of the matter borne down by a river, that which is 
of greater specific gravity than the water itself, sinks as soon as the 
force of the current ceases to bear it forward? Is it not certain that 
no river of the globe continues its current more than a few miles 
after it enters the ocean ? Is it not impossible then that rivers can 
have diffused their detritus over the whole bottom of the ocean? Are 
not the strata, however, spread over vast areas ? Give examples. 
What can be more clear than that these strata can never have been 
formed over such immense spaces by the agency of rivers ? What is 
Sir C. Lyell's theory of the agency of rivers in the formation of 
strata ? Could a river ever by that process form a layer of pebbles 
or sand over more than a very limited space ? State the reason that 
it could not. What is his theory in respect to a change of the points 
at which rivers enter the ocean ? Could such changes ever enable 



EESPEOTING THE MATEEIALS OF THE STEATA. 257 

them to spread their earthy and vegetable matter over the whole bot- 
tom of a spacious sea ? 

And finally, is not the distribution of the chief elements of the 
strata into separate layers inexplicable on their theory ? What are 
those elements? How are the difi'erent earthy elements borne down 
by rivers usually deposited ? Are they sorted, or thrown down pro- 
miscuously ? What is the manner in which the elements of the strata 
were distributed ? Specify the elements of the leading groups. Reca- 
pitulate these various proofs of the error of the theory. 



258 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 



CHAPTER XI. 

False Theories of Geologists respecting the Formation of the Strata. 

That branch of tlieir theory which relates to the 
sources whence the materials of the strata were 
derived, and the agents by which they were conveyed 
to their place of deposition being thus confuted, the 
next inquiry respects their other great postulate, that 
the original formation of the strata and the modifica- 
tions to which they have been subjected, were the 
work of the chemical and mechanical forces that are 
now producing changes in the earth's surface, and 
were the result of agencies, in the main, of only their 
present measure of intensity. If this postulate, on 
which they found the most of their reasonings, is 
shown to be gratuitously assumed also, inconsistent 
with the most important characteristics of the strata, 
and in contravention of the principles of the science, 
then the second main ground of their inference of the 
great age of the world will also be overthrown : and 
such is undoubtedly its character. 

As it is apparent from the preceding discussion that 
streams and rivers have had no important agency in 



EESPECTEN'G- THE FOliilATION OF THE STRATA. 259 

the conveyance of tlie materials of the strata to the 
points of their deposition, they are in the main 
exchided from the question. There are no traces of 
their influence imtil a large part of the depositions 
were formed, and whatever efl'ects they may have 
produced towards the close of the secondary and 
during the tertiary periods, they must, from the 
resistance currents from the land meet on entering 
the ocean, have been confined to the vicinity of the 
points of their debouchure. The question, therefore, 
as far as all the most extensive and important efl'ects 
are concerned, relates only to the chemical and vol-. 
canic forces, and the mechanical agencies of the 
ocean under which the strata were formed, and sub- 
sequently thrown into their present conditions. 

And in the first place, the assumption that all 
these great effects are the result of the causes that 
are now in activity, and arose gradually from agen- 
cies of essentially the intensity they are now exerting, 
is based on altogether inadequate and mistaken 
ground. It certainly is not a self-evident proposition. 
There is nothing in the nature of the strata them- 
selves that shows directly that they must have been 
formed exclusively by causes like these, acting with 
only their present energy. If that is made a princi- 
ple or postulate of the science, it must first, like other 
facts, be established by appropriate evidence. But 
no such demonstration of it is furnished by geologists. 



260 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

It is either assumed without any attempt at its veri- 
fication, or founded on vague and imaginary analo- 
gies. Thus Sir Charles Lyell, for example, who in 
the construction and support of his theory reasons 
altogether from the present to the past, takes for 
granted at every step of his argument, the point on 
which its validity depends ;* namely, not only that 
the causes now producing geological effects on the 
globe are the same in kind as those to which the 
stratified rocks owe their existence and modifications, 
but that the scale on which they are now acting, and 
the rate at which they are giving birth to their 
several effects, are the measure of the energy with 

* " Now the principal source from whence we are enabled to draw 
such conclusions respecting the nature of the solid materials of the 
earth, and the changes which they have undergone, is a comparison ' 
of geological phenomena with the effects . previously known to have 
been produced in modern times by running water and subterranean 
heat. Hence the utility of one of the preceding treatises on aqueous 
and igneous causes, in which it was shown that strata are at present 
in the course of formation by rivers and marine currents ; both in 
seas and lakes 5 and that in several parts of the world rocks have 
been rent, tilted, and broken, by sudden earthquakes ; or have been 
heaved up above, or let down below their former level ; also that 
volcanic eruptions have given rise to mountain masses made up of 
scoriae, and of stone both porous and solid 

" From these remarks it will be seen that u study of systematic " 
treatises on the recent changes of the organic and inorganic world, 
affords a good preliminary exercise for those who desire to interpret 
geological movements. They are thus enabled to proceed from the 
known to the unknown, or from the observed effects of causes now in 
action to the analogous effects of the same or similar causes which 
have acted at remote periods^ — LyelVs Principles, Preface, pp. 
xiii., xiv. 



RESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 261 

which they acted, and the rapidity with which they 
wrought their results, in the formation of the strata. 
For he offers nothing but the effects themselves that 
are now in the process of production, the strength of 
the agents that are bringing them into existence, and 
the rapidity with which they are wrought as proofs 
that all the geological effects of ancient times which 
it is his aim to explain, were wrought, by the same 
agents at the same rate; and thence makes the 
ground of his inference that the periods occupied in 
their production must have been of the immeasurable 
length which he ascribes to them. But the effects 
that are now taking place plainly yield no verifica- 
tion of his inference, unless it is either self-evident, 
or is shown by extraneous proof, that all the geologi- 
cal effects in question must necessarily have been 
produced by the same cause, acting, uniformly with 
the same energy. But tha.t, instead of proving, he 
takes for granted. His argument, accordingly, ex- 
pressed syllogistically, is nothing more than the fol- 
lowing : 

All the geological changes that have been produced 
on the globe have been the work of causes identically 
the same in kind, energy, and the rapidity with which 
they produced their effects. 

But the causes that are now giving birth to geolo- 
gical changes are feeble, and advance at a very slow 
rate in the production of their effects. 



262 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

Therefore, the causes under which the formation of 
the stratified rocks took place, must have been simi- 
larly feeble, and advanced at a similarly slow rate in 
the production of their effects. 

And again : 

The energy with which geological causes act, and 
the rate at which they give birth to their effects, are 
uniformly the same at all periods. 

But the energy of the causes that are now workiug 
changes on the earth is slight, and long periods are 
occupied in the completion of their effects. 

Therefore, the causes by which the strata of the 
earth were produced were equally slight in their en- 
ergy, and periods equally long in proportion to the 
magnitude of the effects they produced, w^ere occupied 
in their completion. 

The whole point to be established, is thus assumed 
in the premise from which it is deduced. He pro- 
ceeds throughout his discussion on a mistaken view 
of the real question in debate — which is, what the 
causes were by which the stratified rocks were formed, 
and what the mode was of their agency and the 
rapidity with which they wrought their effects — 
which is to be determined by the nature of the effects ; 
not — which is the position he employs himself in 
endeavoring to evince — whether, on the supposition 
that the causes that are giving birth to geological 
effects, are in nature, strength, and rate of produc- 



RESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 263 

tion, identically like those by which all former effects 
were produced, immeasurably long periods must not 
have been occupied in their completion. In the one 
case, those ancient effects are made the measure of 
their causes ; in the other, modern effects, which are 
wholly inferior in magnitude, and in a large degree 
of a different nature, are made their measure. His 
whole system is thus built on the assumption of the 
premise from which it is deduced. He accordingly 
does not generally attempt directly and absolutely to 
demonstrate the solutions he suggests of the pheno- 
mena, real or presumed, which he endeavors to ex- 
plain ; but presents them simply as suppositions 
which — admitting the postulate on which he proceeds 
— furnish possible or probable explanations of them. 
Thus it is by such a mere hypothesis that he endea- 
vors to account for the great variations in the tempera- 
ture of the globe, which he assumes have taken 
place. 

"I shall now proceed to speculate on the vicissitudes of 
climate which must attend those endless variations in tbe 
geographical features of our planet, which are contemplated 
in geology. That our speculations may be confined within 
the strict limits of analogy, I shall assume, 1st, That the 
proportion of dry land to sea continues always the same ; 
2dly, That the volume of the land rising above the level of 
the sea is a constant quantity ; and not only that its mean, 



264: FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

but that its extreme height, are liable only to trifling varia- 
tions ; 3dly, That both the mean and extreme depth of the 
sea are invariable ; and 4thly, It may be consistent with 
due caution to assume that the grouping together of the 
land in great continents is a necessary part of the economy 
of nature ; for it is possible that the laws which govern the 
subterranean forces, and which act simultaneously along cer- 
tain lines, cannot but produce at every epoch continuous 
mountain chains, so that the subdivision of the whole land 
into innumerable islands may be precluded. 

** If it be objected that the maximum of elevation of land 
and depth of sea are jprohaUy not constant, nor the gather- 
ing together of all the land in certain parts, nor even ^er- 
ha^s the relative extent of land and water : I reply, that 
the arguments about to be adduced will be strengthened, if 
in these peculiarities of surface there be considerable devia- 
tions from the present type. If, for example, all other cir- 
cumstances being the same, the land is at any one time more 
divided into islands than another, a greater uniformity of 
climate might be produced, the mean temperature remaining 
unaltered ; or if at another era there were mountains higher 
than the Himalaya, these, when placed in high latitudes, 
would cause a greater excess of cold. Or if we suppose that 
at certain periods no chain of hills in the world rose beyond 
a height of 10,000 feet, a greater heat might then have pre- 
vailed than is compatible with the existence of mountains 
thrice that elevation. 

" However constant may be the relative proportion of sea 
and land, we know that there is annually some small varia- 



RESPECTING THE FOEMATION OF THE STRATA. 265 

tion in their respective geographical positions, and that in 
every century the land is in some parts raised, and in others 
depressed by earthquakes, and so likewise is the bed of the 
sea. By these and other ceaseless changes, the configura- 
tion of the earth's surface has been remodelled again and 
again since it was the habitation of organic beings, and the 
bed of the ocean has been lifted up to the height of some of 
the loftiest mountains 

"If we now proceed to consider the circumstances required 
for a general change of temperature, it will appear from the 
facts and principles already laid down, that whenever a 
greater extent of high land is collected in the polar regions, 
the cold will augment ; and the same result will be pro- 
duced when there is more sea between or near the tropics ; 
while, on the contrary, so often as the above conditions are 
reversed, the heat will be greater. If this he admitted, it 
will follow, that unless the superficial inequalities of the 
earth be fixed a;nd permanent, there must be never-ending 
fluctuations in the mean temperature of every zone ; and 
that the climate of our era can no more he the type of every 
other, than one of our four seasons of all the rest. 

" To simplify our view of the various changes in climate 
which different combinations of geographical circumstances 
may produce, we shall first consider the conditions necessary 
for bringing about the extreme of cold, or what may be 
termed the winter of the ' great year,' or geological cycle, 
and afterwards the conditions requisite to produce the maxi- 
mum of heat, or the summer of the same year. 

" To begin with the northern hemisphere, let us suppose 

12 



266 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

those hills of the Italian peninsula and of Sicily, which are 
of comparatively modern origin, and contain fossil shells 
identical with living species, to subside again into the sea 
from which they have been raised, and that an extent of 
land of equal area and height, varying from one to three 
thousand feet, should rise up in the Arctic ocean, between 
Siberia and the north pole. In speaking of such changes 
I shall not allude to the manner in which I conceive it 
possible they may be brought about, nor to the time required 
for their accomplishment — reserving for a future occasion 
not only the proof that revolutions of equal magnitude have 
taken place, but that analogous operations are still in gra- 
dual progress. The alteration now supposed in the physi- 
cal geography of the northern regions would cause addi- 
tional snow and ice to accumulate where now there is usually 
an open sea ; and the temperature of the greater part of 
Europe would be somewhat lowered, so as to resemble more 
nearly that of corresponding latitudes of North America ; 
or, in other words, it might be necessary to travel about 10° 
further south to meet with the same climate which we now 
enjoy. Hso compensation would be derived from the disap- 
pearance of land in the Mediterranean countries ; but the 
contrary, since the mean heat of the soil in those latitudes 
is probably far above those which would belong to the sea, 
by which we imagine it to be replaced. 

" But let the configuration of the surface be still further 
varied, and let some large district within or near the tropics, 
such as Mexico, with its mountains rising to the height of 
twelve thousand feet and upwards, be converted into sea, 



KESPECTING THE FOEMATION OF THE STEATA. 267 

while lands of equal elevation and extent rise up in the arc- 
tic circle. From this change there would, in the first place, 
result a sensible diminution of temperature near the tropic, 
for the soil of Mexico would no longer be heated by the sun, 
so that the atmosphere would be less warm, as also the 
neighboring Atlantic. On the other hand, the whole of 
Europe, Northern Asia, and North America would be chilled 
by the enormous quantity of ice and snow, thus generated 
on vast heights on the new arctic continent. If, as we have 
already seen, there are now some points in the Southern 
hemisphere where snow is perpetual down to the level of the 
sea, in latitudes as low as central England, such might 
assuredly be the case throughout a great part of Europe, 
under the change of circumstances above supposed ; and if 
at present the extreme range of drifted icebergs is the 
Azores, they might easily reach the equator after the 
assumed alteration. But to pursue the subject still further 
— let the Himalaya mountains, with the whole of Hindostan, 
sink down, and their place be occupied by the Indian Ocean, 
while an equal extent of territory and mountains of the 
same vast height rise up between North Greenland and the 
Orkney Islands. It seems difficult to exaggerate the 
amount to which the climate of the Northern hemisphere 

would then be cooled 

" Let us now turn from the contemplation of the winter 
of the ' great year,' and consider the opposite train of cir- 
cumstances which would bring on the spring and summer. 
To ima,gine all the lands to be collected together in equato- 
rial latitudes, and a few promontories only to project beyond 



268 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

the thirtieth parallel, would be undoubtedly to suppose an 
extreme result of geological change. But if we consider a 
mere approximation to such a state of things, it would be 
sufficient to cause a general elevation of temperature. Nor 
can it be regarded as a visionary idea that amidst the revo- 
lutions of the earth's surface, the quantity of land should, at 
certain periods, have been simultaneously lessened in the 
vicinity of both the poles, and increased within the tropics. 
We must recollect that even now it is necessary to ascend to 
the height of fifteen thousand feet in the Andes under the 
line, and in the Himalaya mountains which are without the 
tropic, to seventeen thousand feet, before we reach the limits 
of perpetual snow. On the northern slope, indeed, of the 
Himalaya range, where the heat radiated from a great con- 
tinent moderates the cold, there are meadows and cultivated 
land at an elevation equal to the height of Mont Blanc. 
If, then, there were no arctic lands to chill the atmosphere 
and freeze the sea, and if the loftiest chains were near the 
line, it seems reasonable to imagine that the highest moun- 
tains might be clothed with a rich vegetation to their sum- 
mits, and that nearly all signs of frost would disappear from 
the earth. 

" When the absorption of the solar rays was in no region 
impeded, even in winter, by a coat of snow, the mean heat 
of the earth's crust would augment to a considerable depth ; 
and springs, which we know in general to be an index of the 
mean temperature of the climate, would be warmer in all 
latitudes. The waters of lakes, therefore, and rivers, would 
be much hotter in winter, and would never be chilled in 



KESPECTma THE FORMATION OP THE STRATA. 269 

summer by melted snow and ice. A remarkable uniformity 
of climate would prevail amid the archipelagoes of the tem- 
perate and polar oceans, where the tepid waters of equa- 
torial currents would freely circulate 

" We might expect, therefore, in the summer of the ' great 
year,' which we are now considering, that there would be a 
predominance of tree-ferns and plants allied to palms and 
arborescent grasses in the islands of the wide ocean, while 
the dicotyledonous plants and other forms now most com- 
mon in temperate regions would almost disappear from the 
earth. Then might those genera of animals return, of which 
the memorials are preserved in the ancient rocks of our con- 
tinents. The huge iguanodon might reappear in the woods, 
and the ichthyosaur in the sea, while the pterodactyle might 
jQit again through umbrageous groves of tree-ferns. Coral 
reefs might be prolonged once more beyond the arctic cir- 
cle, where the whale and the narwal now abound ; and 
droves of turtles might wander again through regions now 
tenanted by the walrus and the seal. 

" But not to indulge too far in these speculations, I may 
observe, in conclusion, that however great during the lapse 
of ages may be the vicissitudes of temperature in every zone, 
it accords with this theory that the general climate should 
not experience any sensible change in the course of a few 
thousand years, because that period is insufficient to affect 
the leading features of the physical geography of the globe." 
— Principles J Book i., chap, vii., pp. 121-131. 

This is perhaps the most ingenious and elaborate 



270 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

theory presented by Sir Charles Lyell in the whole 
course of his speculations to account for the geolo- 
gical conditions which he suj)poses to have once 
existed; and were the reality of those conditions 
admitted, it would in some respects form a plausible 
solution of the effects he refers to them. Instead, 
however, of being established by a scientific induc- 
tion, it is a mere supposition. Not a pretence is 
made of demonstrating it by direct and indubitable 
evidence. Every one of its propositions that is made 
the basis of the inference he aims to sustain by it, is 
preceded by an IF, tall 

"As the mast 
Of some great admiral." 

The only consideration he offers to support it is, 
that if the conditions and processes he supposes are 
admitted, they seemingly furnish a natural and ade- 
quate explanation of the variations of temperature 
and peculiar forms of vegetable and animal life, 
which he holds characterized the earth at certain 
stages of its ancient history. It contributes nothing, 
therefore, towards the verification of his general 
theory respecting the force by which the strata were 
formed, and the vast series of ages their deposition 
occupied. To treat it as a fact ; to exalt it to the 
rank of a positive proof of that great hypothesis ; to 
make it the basis of a rejection and confutation of the 



RESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 271 

testimony of tlie Scriptures respecting the date of the 
creation of the earth, is truly an extraordinary mis- 
judgment. The fact that it apparently presents ah 
explication of the conditions and events it is invented 
to explain is no evidence of its truth. To admit the 
validity of such a method of establishing a system, 
would be at a blow to annihilate every fact of expe- 
rience, and overthrow every truth of science. The 
theory of Buffon, of Burnet, of Whiston, of La Place, 
respecting the origin and laws of the world, might, 
by such a pro.eess, be as effe<jtually established as 
that of ISTewton. 

Its want of pertinence to the immediate purpose 
for which he employs it is not, however, its only dis- 
qualification for the support of his system ; as he 
deserts in it the great postulate on which he profes- 
sedly proceeds, that the forces that are producing 
changes in the earth's surface act without intermis- 
sion and with a uniform energy ; and tacitly assumes 
that those forces at certain crises operate with thou- 
sands of times their ordinary intensity, and give birth 
to changes immeasurably above the usual range of 
their effects ; as it is inconsistent with the conditions 
he prescribes to himself, to suppose that under such 
a process, " the general climate should not experience 
any sensible change in the course of a few thousand 
years ; because that period is insufficient to affect the 
leading features of the physical geography of the 



272 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

globe," which he supposes to be so wholly revolu- 
tionized. It would be impossible that such an eleva- 
tion of a continent with lofty mountains in one part 
of the ocean, should take place simultaneously with 
a depression of an equal area of land with mountains 
of the same height in another ; and yet at the same 
time, " the proportion of dry land to sea conti^iue the 
same ; the volume of the land rising above the sea 
be a constant quantity ; and not only its mean but 
its extreme height be liable only to trifling varia- 
tions ; and both the mean and extreme depths of the 
sea be invariable," unless the change took place 
instantaneously, or at least was completed in so brief 
a space that the period occupied in it would not be 
of any geological consideration. For on no other 
condition could the proportion of dry land to sea, 
the volume of land above the level of the sea, and 
both the mean and extreme height of the mountains, 
continue the same. If the elevation, for example, 
of the supposed continent in the sea between 
Greenland and the Orkneys, took place at the 
same rate as the depression of the Himalaya 
mountains and Hindostan, and advanced so gradually 
as to be prolonged through a vast round of ages, it is 
manifest that Hindostan would descend beneath it 
thousands of years before the corresponding part of 
the arctic continent could emerge from its bosom. 
The submersion of Hindostan would take place in the 



RESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 273 

early stages of the revolution ; the ascent of the other 
at its close. During the vast period therefore that 
intervened, the proportion of dry land to sea, and of 
the volume of land rising above the level of the sea, 
instead of remaining constant, would, to that extent, 
be altered ; and consequently an equal change would 
be produced in the mean and extreme depth of the 
ocean. Moreover, as there are great inequalities in 
the surface of Hindostan, a large part consisting of 
low plains, part of high table lands and elevated 
valleys, and part rising into lofty mountain ranges — 
other subordinate variations in the proportion of land 
to sea would take place while the submersion was in 
progress. A depression of two to three hundred feet 
would carry beneath the waters all the lower plain 
of the Ganges and a wide tract along the eastern 
coast of the peninsula, probably together equal to one 
third of the whole. A further descent of Rye hun- 
dred feet would leave nothing above the waves except 
the mountains, the table lands, and the high valleys 
that lie between the ranges or heights of the Hima- 
laya. The table lands that slope from the Ghauts on 
the western side of the peninsula to the opposite coast 
on the bay of Bengal, rise from 1700 to 2800 or 3000 
feet above the level of the ocean ; and the lower of 
the high valleys of the Himalaya, 2000 feet. They 
would be submerged therefore by an additional 
descent of 1200 to 2200 feet. A further depression 

12* 



274 FALSE THEOBIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

of 1200 to 1500 feet would carry beneath the waters 
other valleys of the Himalaya, that are at an eleva- 
tion of 4000 to 4500 feet. There would then remain 
south of the Himalaya only the Yindhyan range of 
mountains, running across the peninsula, north of the 
Nerbudda to the western coast, and the western and 
eastern Ghauts, the former of which rise from 6000 
to near 9000 feet.* There would thus be five or six 
stages in the submersion, at which great changes 
would take place in the proportion of the land to the 
sea, and of the volume of land rising above the water. 
Equal variations also in the opposite direction would 
result from the emergence from the ocean of those 
parts of the supposed arctic continent, that would 
correspond to these divisions of Hindostan. 

It is physically impossible, therefore, that the 
changes he contemplates should take place without 
producing repeated and great variations in the ave- 
rage of the extent and the volume of dry land, and of the 
depth of the sea, unless they were wrought with such 
rapidity that the time which they occupied should be 
of no consideration. But to be accomplished with such 
rapidity would require an intensity of volcanic forces 
immeasurably transcending those that are ordinarily 
exerted in the modification of the earth's surface. 
The effects also would boundlessly surpass in magni- 

* Macculloch's Geographical Dictionary ; Articles Himalaya and 
Hindostan. Guyot's Earth and Man, p. 66. 



EESPECXma THE FORMATION OF THE STEATA. 275 

tude any that are now in progress, or tliat liave hap- 
pened for many ages. Such a depression of one con- 
tinent and elevation of another would produce move- 
ments of the ocean also, on a scale and of a violence 
immensely beyond those of ordinary disturbances of 
its bed by earthquakes. Wide-spreading deluges, and 
the wreck of islands and continents generally, would 
inevitably result from them. 

He thus in his hypothesis completely deserts the 
theory of the uniform force and activity of geological 
agents, on which he founds his system ; and tacitly 
raises those of fire and water to so vast an energy, and 
exhibits them as acting on so stupendous a scale, and 
dispatching their effects with such celerity, as to dis- 
countenance and set aside the grounds on which he 
builds his inference, that long periods have been em- 
ployed in the deposition and modification of the strata. 
Of this purely supposititious character are many of 
the other solutions which he presents of the pheno- 
mena he attempts to explain ; and such are the specu- 
lations also generally of those who maintain that the 
stratified rocks were formed by the geological agents 
that are now in activity, and at a rate essentially the 
same as that at which they produced their present 

* We may indicate as examples, their theories respecting the pro- 
ductioa of gneiss, the origin of lime and challv, the formation of salt 
and coal, the causes of denudation, the sources of drift, the deposi- 
tion of alluvia, the periods at which different classes of animals began 
to exist, and a crowd of others. 



276 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

effects."^ Tliey are mere conjectures or suppositions, 
not demonstrated facts, and present, therefore, no 
basis for a scientific induction of the inference they 
found on them of the great age of the world. 

QUESTIONS. 

What is their second postulate which is examined in this chapter ? 
Is it clear from what has already been shown, that rivers had no im- 
portant agency in the formation of the strata ? What then are the 
agents by which, according to the theory, the strata must have been 
formed ? What is the first objection to the theory that the strata are 
the work of such causes in kind and energy as are now in activity on 
the earth's surface ? Ought it not to be demonstrated, instead of gra- 
tuitously assumed? Have geologists verified it by proofs? What 
course does Sir C. Lyell pursue in regard to it ? What is the only 
consideration which he offers to prove it? But what points ought he 
to establish, in order that that consideration may demonstrate that 
which he alleges it as proving ? Does he establish that point, or does 
he take it for granted ? State his argument in a syllogistic form : 
fia^st, in which all changes are affirmed to be the effects of the same 
causes ; and next, in which all causes are afifirmed to act with the 
same energy. Is it clear from these that he assumes in his premise 
the whole point which he affects to prove ? What is the question 
which he should have debated ? What is the question which he in 
fact debates ? Does he thus try the question by a false measure ? 
Does he pursue this course generally in his attempts to account for 
particular effects? State his mode of explaining the changes in the 
temperature of the earth. Does he establish this by a scientific induc- 
tion, or does he merely afl&rm, that if the conditions he supposes are 
admitted, then the results for which he contends would follow ? Is it 
not wholly unphilosophical thus to substitute hypotheses for facts ; 
assumptions for proof ? Might not the theories of Buffon, Whiston, 
La Place, and the author of the Vestiges of Creation, be established 



RESPECTING THE FOEMATION OF THE STRATA. 2TT 

by that process, as well as his theory of the changes for which he 
attempts to account ? Does he not also desert in it the postulate on 
which he professedly proceeds, that the forces that are producing 
changes on the earth act uninterruptedly, and with the same energy ? 
State the mistake into which he falls in the representation that if 
Hindostan with the Himalaya mountains were slowly to sink be- 
neath the ocean, and a continent of equal dimensions, a similar gene- 
ral surface, and like mountains, were at the same time to rise at the 
same rate from the ocean between the Orkneys and Greenland, the 
quantity of land that would rise above the ocean would, at any stage 
of the process, precisely equal that which would descend beneath it. 
Exemplify the error of that assumption. If two pyramids of equal 
dimensions were to pass through such a change of positions, is it not 
clear that the twenty feet of the base of the pyramid that sunk 
beneath the water, while twenty feet of the apex of the other rose 
out of it, would comprise hundreds and thousands of times as many 
cubic feet as the apex comprised ? Are many of the solutions of facts 
which geologists offer as confirmations of their theory, of the same 
supposititious character, and contradictory to their own principles ? 



278 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 



CHAPTEE XII. 

False Theories of Geologists respecting the Formation of the Strata. 

But this great postulate of their system is not only 
merely hypothetical and unsupported by evidence ; 
it is confuted, and shown to be wholly groundless, by 
the fact that many of the most extensive and 
important of the geological effects which it professes 
to explain, are not now in the process of production, 
nor the causes to which they owed their existence 
any longer in activity. If the assumption were 
correct that the forces by which geological effects are 
produced are in the main at all periods identically 
the same, act uniformly with the same energ}^, and 
generate the changes to which they give birth at the 
same rate, then every class of effects that has ever 
resulted from their agency would continue to be 
wrought by them at the present time, and on a scale 
as vast as at any former period. IsTothing, however, 
is more certain than that many of the most important 
species of those effects are no longer taking place, 
and thence that the causes in which they originated 



EESPECTHra THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 279 

are no longer in activity, at least in the conditions 
and forms in whicli they give rise to such products. 

Such is the formation of granite. That rock is 
more extensive, exists in greater volume, and fills and 
has filled a more important office in respect to the 
sedimentary strata, than any other in the series. It is 
far the greatest and the most significant of the eflfects 
that are the subject of geological inquiry. It wraps, 
it is generally believed, the whole circle of the globe, 
and is the basis on which all the other , formations 
rest ; and it has come into existence, or received its 
present form, at least to a vast extent, since the for- 
mation of large portions of the rocks which now 
repose on it. Those masses of it indisputably w^hich 
rise above the original level of the sedimentary rocks, 
and form the centres of the great mountain ranges, 
were formed and elevated into their present positions 
after -the deposition of the strata that lie on their 
summits, or rest on their sides, and they are now 
accordingly referred by geologists generally to the 
close of the secondary, or to the tertiary period. 

Eut no granite, so far as is known, is produced at 
the present time, nor has been since the formation of 
the masses that constitute the main element of the 
great mountain ranges, and were the instrument by 
which the sedimentary strata that clothe their sides, 
and rest on many of their heights, were thrown up. 
There is not the slightest proof, or probability even, 



280 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

that a particle of it has been crystallized for ages. 
"What the conditions are, indeed, that are essential to 
its formation, are not fully known. It is generally 
held to be the result of fusion ; but what the precise 
combination of causes is, or what the circumstances 
are in which they must act in order to unite the 
ingredients of which it consists in the proportions and 
forms that constitute its peculiarities, there are no 
means in the present state of the science of deter- 
mining. 

The greatest and most important geological process 
that has ever taken place on the earth's surface, and 
that was wrought on its greatest scale at a late 
period in the formation of the sedimentary strata, is 
thus wholly unlike any that is now in progress, or has 
been for ages, and confutes therefore the theory that 
the forces by which the crust of the earth was formed 
and modified, exist and operate with the same energy, 
and give birth to the same species of effects, and on 
the same scale, at all periods. 

Gneiss, also micaceous, chlorite, and argillaceous 
schist, quartz rock, and other species that belong to 
the first series of the stratified formations, are not 
now in the process of deposition, and have not been 
for ages, nor are there any indications that the causes 
from which they sprang are any longer in activity. 
These also, though not universal, like granite, are 
very extensive. They underlie very generally, as far 



RESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 281 

as is known, the secondary formation, and are, in 
many localities, of immense depth. They constitute 
proofs, therefore, as vast as they themselves are, that 
the geological forces by which the strata have been 
formed, do not act without intermission, and with an 
unvarying energy, and give birth to their effects at 
the same rate at all periods. If that were their law, 
these rocks, instead of being confined to the primary 
formation, would have been intermixed with the 
whole secondary and tertiary series, and would now 
be generating on as great a scale as they were in 
their own proper age. Can a more emphatic confu- 
tation be asked of the doctrine, that geological causes 
act at all periods with an unvarying energy ? 

Serpentine, greenstone, basalt, and nearly the 
whole series of trap rocks, also came into existence 
exclusively, so far as is known, at a period long past. 
They were first thrown up, it is generally held, after 
the completion of the primary series, and their epoch 
appears to have closed near the commencement of 
the tertiary. They were as manifestly the product 
of a limited period, and owed their existence to a 
condition of the globe that no longer exists, as the 
formation of granite, gneiss, quartz rock, old red 
sandstone, or any other rock, the production of which 
has ceased. To assume, as a self-evident proposition, 
that the causes by which these immense masses were 
thrown up from the unfathomable depths of the earth, 



282 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

tliroiigli the vast series of crystalline, primary, and 
secondary rocks, are still in uninterrupted, activity, 
and giving birth on an unvarying scale to the same 
effects, and make that postulate the basis of a theory 
of the whole series of formations, is to offer a contra- 
diction to fact that is not often exceeded in boldness 
and extravagance. 

Sand, gravel, and pebbles, are still more impor- 
tant elements of the earth's crust, that owe their 
existence to causes that are no longer in activity. 
They not only form, in a great measure, the loose un- 
stratified mass that lies on the surface of the globe, 
but enter very largely into the composition of the 
principal layers in every group of strata throughout 
the secondary and tertiary formations — sandstones of 
every class, many conglomerates, and the arenaceous 
forms of shale and limestone — and constitute not im- 
probably one-third of the whole mass from the lowest 
to the last of the fossiliferous beds. And they were 
all formed undoubtedly by chemical forces at the 
points and at the time of their deposition from the 
ocean ; as there are no known agents by which, had 
they originated elsewhere, they could have been dis- 
tributed over such vast spaces, and immixed so 
equably in the strata in which they are imbedded. 
Had the materials of which they consist been origi- 
nally derived, as geologists maintain, from granite 
continents, and borne down to the sea by rivers, they 



BESPECTING THE FOKMATION OF THE STRATA. 283 

still must have received their present form after their 
diffusion through the waters from which they were 
precipitated ; as their structure is not now crystalline 
like that of the quartz, felspar, mica, and hornblende 
of granite, but granular and concretionary, and the 
product therefore of a wholly different chemical 
agency. Their formation is, accordingly, one of the 
greatest and most peculiar of which the surface of the 
earth has been the theatre. The number of particles, 
grains, pebbles, and stones of larger size, that belong 
to this class in single layers of moderate extent, tran- 
scends immeasurably our powers of enumeration, and 
can be grasped only by Omniscience. How infinite 
then is the multitude that constitute their whole mass ! 
Many of the strata of which they are the principal 
ingredient, are spread over vast areas, and of great 
depth. Groups of the old red sandstone are in some 
localities three or four thousand feet in thickness. 
Yet every one of those grains and pebbles, small or 
large, is of itself a proof of the error of the doctrine 
that the causes by which they were produced are still 
in activity, and perpetually giving birth to similar 
formations. Not a particle of sand or gravel, not a 
solitary pebble or mass of larger size, like those which 
are imbedded in conglomerates, has been brought into 
existence for ages. The supposition is, as we have 
already shown, inconsistent with the conditions that 
are requisite to such concretions. The silex that is 



284 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

now deposited on the earth's surface, is deposited 
from waters that are raised to an intense heat, and 
instead of uniting to form sand or gravel, takes the 
shape of incrustations on stems, leaves, and other 
objects on which it happens to be thrown down. As 
absolute proof as the laj)se of many ages, without a 
solitary addition to their countless throng, can form, 
exists therefore, that neither the chemical agents are 
now in activity, nor the waters of the ocean in the 
conditions that are requisite to their production. The 
fancy that they are, is as palpably against the fact, 
and as irreconcilable with the laws that now govern 
the modifications of matter, as it were to imagine that 
new suns are forming in our firmament, or new moons 
generating to revolve with ours around our earth. 

Such is the fact, also, with lime. No deposits 
of that mineral now take place on the surface, except 
such as is thrown np by springs, and is derived there- 
fore from the strata over which those waters run : and 
that, on its deposition, forms a loose porous mass, 
essentially nnlike the limestones from which it is 
drawn. J^ot a grain is added by the process to the 
general mass of the mineral. There is only a trans- 
ference of particles from earlier formations that lie at 
a considerable depth, and union of them again at the 
surface in a new form. But if the causes that origi- 
nally gave birth to the vast beds of limestone that 
occur throughout the whole series, from the earliest 



BESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 285 

to the latest of the stratified rocks, are still in uninter- 
rupted activity, and generating new deposits on as 
great a scale as at former periods, wliy is it that none 
of these new formations are noticed or discovered ? 
Whj is it that not a particle can be shown to be 
added to the aggregate ? What can be more unsci- 
entific than thus to maintain the continued activity 
and undiminished energy of causes that once operated 
on so immense a scale and generated such massive 
products, though no fruits whatever are seen of their 
present agency ; though the most indisputable proofs 
of their discontinuance for ages are presented in the 
fact, that through tliat long period they have not 
given birth to any of their proper effects ? 

Chalk was, in like manner, the product of peculiar 
causes acting in peculiar circumstances for a limited 
period. It is not, like limestone, sandstone, and shales, 
distributed in frequent beds throughout the whole 
series of the strata, but occurs only in a single group 
near the close of the secondary formation. ]N^or is it 
generally diffused like many of the earlier and later 
deposits, or found in all the localities where the other 
members of the group to which it belongs occur. 
Instead, it is confined to comparatively narrow limits. 

" Respecting the geographical distribution of the creta- 
ceous group .... throughout the British Islands, a large 
part of France, many parts of Germany, in Poland, Swe- 



286 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

den, and in various parts of Russia, there would appear to 
have been certain causes in operation, at a given period, which 
produced nearly, or very nearly the same effects. The varia- 
tion in the lower portion of the deposit seems merely to con- 
sist in the absence or presence of a greater or less abundance 
of clays or sands, substances which we may consider as pro- 
duced by the destruction of previously existing land, and as 
deposited from waters which held such detritus in mechani- 
cal solution. The unequal deposit of the two kinds of mat- 
ter in different situations would be in accordance with such 
a supposition. But when we turn to the higher part of the 
group, into which the lower portion graduates, the theory 
of mere transport appears opposed to the phenomena obser- 
ved, which seem rather to have been produced by deposit 
from chemical solution of carbonate of lime and silex." — 
Sir H. T. De La BtcMs Manual, p. 259. 

The limitation of this formation to a single period 
and to a narrow area, is thus whollj irreconcilable 
with the theory that geological causes act at all periods 
and with a uniform energy. If that postulate were 
true, chalk should exist, and on as great a scale in the 
different groups of the primary and earlier classes of 
the secondary formations, as it does in the series to 
which it gives its chief characteristic. It should 
occupy a proportional place also among the tertiary 
strata, and be in the process of formation at the pre- 
sent time. 'No indications appear, however, of sucli 
formations since the commencement of the tertiary 



RESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 287 

period. Can a more decisive proof be demanded of 
the error of that postulate? Can a proposition be 
advanced in more direct and palpable repugnance to 
facts ? 

Rock salt, in like manner, instead of being inter- 
spersed like sandstone, limestone, and shale, through 
the whole succession of the strata, as the theory of 
the uniform activity and energy of geological causes 
requires, is mainly confined to a single era. There are 
examples, indeed, of the rise of salt springs, as in this 
State, from the ISTew York or Silurian system. Even 
they, however, are generally associated with the new 
red sandstone, or the groups with which that is imme- 
diately connected ; and rock salt itself occurs chiefly 
in that formation. Though found in every quarter of 
the globe, it is not, like sandstone and shale, a univer- 
sal deposit, but exists only in patches, or districts 
widely separated from each other. It is in some 
localities several hundred feet in thickness. Geolo- 
gists, however, instead of being able to point out any 
exemplification in the processes that are now going 
forward of the mode in which it was formed, have 
not hitherto succeeded in presenting any probable 
theory of its origin. 

" It is not surprising that the origin of rock-salt has been 
a subject of much inquiry among geologists ; yet nothing 
like a rational theory has yet been offered. It is far easier 



288 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

to show that the most simple and obvious hypothesis is 
wrong or imperfect than to propose a probable one. The 
origin of gypsum is not less mysterious, even with every con- 
jecture we can make respecting the presence and acidifica- 
tion of sulphur ; yet this inquiry has never excited the same 
anxiety. No rational explanation has yet been suggested ; 
and I have none t'. offer. But we must seek for the greater 
ambition of geologists on the subject of salt, in their wish to 
derive these deposits from the waters of the ocean in a sim- 
ple and direct manner ; seizing on one obvious analogy only, 
to the neglect of other possible modes of explanation. That 
it has been the produce of the ocean is possible, since the 
rocks among which it is found are indebted for their exist- 
ence to the same source. Yet no obvious method of account- 
ing for its peculiar appearances or limitation can be engrafted 
on that general admission ; while it were as well for geo- 
logy, and in other matters than this, if they who deposit 
pure rock salt in the Mediterranean at this day, would learn 
at least as much of chemistry as the ' Chemist' of three blue 
bottles. The desiccation of saline lakes will not account 
for it, because subterranean salt is far more pure than that 
which must be the produce of the evaporation of the sea. 
The mode in which it is disposed will not admit of this 
explanation ; and still less can any system of evaporation 
account for the concretionary structure of the salt of Che- 
shire. 

'*To these difficulties it must be added that the depth of 
sea-water required to produce in this manner some of the 
larger masses known in Europe, is incomprehensible. It 



INSPECTING THE FOIIMATION OF THE STEA.TA. 289 

might also be asked why mariae organic bodies have never 
been found in or near it, and wherefore it is accompanied by 
gypsum. As it is lastly true that the strata which lie 
above it have been deposited from the ocean, it is impossi- 
ble to comprehend how, under these circumstances, evapo- 
ration could have taken place. The subject is beset with 
difficulties — fortunately for the cultivators of a science which 
would lose the greater part of its attractions were there 
nothing left for them to explain. As to the theory which 
derives it from volcanic actions, it seems useless to discuss 
such a question, when no volcanic rocks accompany these 
deposits in the sandstone, and when, with some very slender 
exceptions, deposits of salt are not found attending on this 
class of rocks. Were this the cause, it would remain also 
to be explained why it is limited to the red marl." — Maccul- 
loch's Geology, vol. ii., pp. 293, 294. 

'' We shall not call in question that gem- salt, either pure 
or mixed with muriatiferous clay, may have been deposited 
by an ancient sea ; hut everything evinces that it was formed 
during an order of things hearing no resemhlance to that in 
which the sea at present, by a slower operation, deposits a few 
particles of muriate of soda on the sands of our shores J^ — 
Humholdfs Narrative, vol. ii., p. 262. 

It is tlius tlie product almost exchisivelj of a few 
periods, and of causes or circumstances so obscure and 
peculiar that no satisfactory theory can be formed of 
their nature. It presents a resistless confutation, 
therefore, of the postulate, that the causes of geologi- 

13 



290 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

cal effects are always in activity, and giving birth to 
their several results on the same scale. Whv, if that 
be true, are not masses of rock salt found at every 
stage in the series, from the primary formations to 
the close of the tertiary ? Why are they not now in 
the process of deposition in the bays and gulfs of the 
sea? 

Coal is likewise the product of peculiar causes and 
a limited period ; and of causes or conditions, that, so 
far from being understood, are as much in debate 
among geologists, as the origin of rock salt. That it 
was formed beneath the ocean and mainly of vegeta- 
bles that had their growth on the land, are the only 
points in respect to which they are in any considera- 
ble measure agreed. It is held by one class that 
those vegetables grew where the coal lies, and by 
another that they were transported from a distance by 
rivers and currents. Some maintain that it had its 
origin in peat ; and others in arborescent ferns and 
forest trees. That the principal beds are of a single 
period, proves that the causes by which they were 
generated acted only at that epoch ; and that they are 
confined to a few limited areas, shows that they acted 
only in those scenes, and confutes the doctrine accord- 
ingly that the geological agents by w^hich the strata 
were formed, have acted at all periods, and given 
birth to their effects at a uniform rate. 

Coal ought, on that theory, to be found in as great 



RESPECTING THE FOEMATION OF THE STEATA. 291 

abundance in the primary and tertiary series as in the 
secondary, and to be forming as visibly and rapidly 
at the present period as any other geological efiect 
that is now taking place. 

But besides these and other classes of effects that 
were peculiar to the eras when they were brought 
into existence, and sprung from causes that are no 
longer in activity, it is equally apparent that some of 
the geological agents that are still producing changes 
on the earth's surface, instead of operating at all times 
with the same energy, must have acted during the 
formation of the strata with far greater intensity and 
on a much wider area than at present. This is admit- 
ted by many geologists. 

'' Although it is maintained in one of the most popular 
geological systems that the powers of nature are as active 
and energetic at the present as in ancient periods, still, after 
a survey of the whole subject, and of the evidence on which 
those views rest, doubts of their correctness remain in the 
minds of most geologists. That a more quiescent state would 
now prevail, and tbat the former violence of the elements 
should be restrained, or rather become more feeb-le by a 
more equabk balance of the forces which act and react on 
each other, is agreeable to reason and the benevolence of 
the Great Architect of the universe." — Emmons^s Geology 
of the Second District of New York, p. It. 

Thus the oceau, either from chemical elements im- 



292 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

mixed in it, the motion of its waters in tides and cni'- 
rents, or other causes, must have had a power of dif- 
fusing the materials of the strata that were introduced 
into it, over wide areas, that is altogether unknown at 
the present period. There are many strata of sand- 
stone, limestone, and shale, that originally extended, 
there is reason to believe, without interruption, many 
hundreds, and perhaps even thousands of miles, the 
elements of which, therefore, as they were deposited 
at the same epoch over the whole area, must have 
been interfused through the whole body of the waters. 
And where the beds, after solidification, are fifty, one 
hundred, or perhaps several hundred feet in thick- 
ness, as the materials cannot all have been supj)orted 
by the waters at the same time, the agents by which 
they were transported to the place of deposition must 
have continued in activity for a considerable period. 
But no such power of holding matter in solution or 
suspension, and distributing it over vast areas, is now 
displayed by the ocean. The clay, sand, gravel, and 
ashes that are now introduced into it by streams or 
volcanic eruptions, are thrown down near the points 
where they enter its waters, and produce no change 
whatever on it^ bottom generally. The slight force 
with which it now acts, and the narrow spaces to 
which its effects are confined, scarcely present an 
analogy to the vast scale on which it operated at 
earlier periods and the massy results to which it gave 



EESPECTING THE FOEMATION OF THE STEATA. 293 

birth. To take tlie power with which it now acts as 
the gauge of its energy at former epochs, is as unau- 
thorized and unphilosophical, as it were to make the 
slight effects which it now produces the measure of 
those of all other ages. 

I^ext : The action of the ocean on the continents 
and islands in the erosion of mountain ranges, denu- 
dation of hills, or level tracts of strata, and scooping 
of valleys, which took place on a stupendous scale at 
former epochs, has no parallel in its present agency. 
Instead of sweeping over the land in resistless deluges, 
cutting passages for itself through rocky barriers, and 
.ploughing channels betwixt the hills and across plains, 
it is now confined to its decreed place, and its proud 
waves are stayed by the limits God has assigned it. 
ISTo greater contrast can be conceived than that which 
the limited energy with which it now acts in its nar- 
row sphere, presents to the resistless power with which 
in former ages it swept the continents and islands, 
tore asunder their rocky ranges, cut deep gorges 
through the strata, and transported to new positions 
vast masses of the loose earths that form the present 
surface. 

The fires, in like manner, that burn in the depths 
of the earth, and have acted a more important part 
than any other agent in producing the changes that 
have taken place on the surface, exerted their power 
on an immeasurably greater scale in former ages than 
at present. 



294 FAJLSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

This is seen from the immense formations at earlj 
epochs of granite, of which none, so far as is known, 
is now in the process of production. 

It is seen from the vast masses of porphyry, green- 
stone, basalt, and other rocks of that class that are of 
Yolcanic origin, which are w^holly the product, it is 
generally held, of the secondary, or the first stages of 
the tertiary period. 

It is seen also from the great number of volcanoes 
in every part of the globe, once active and disgorging 
immense masses of lava, that have now for many ages 
been wholly extinct. The number that now burn 
without intermission is very small. They once 
amounted, there is reason to believe^ to many thou- 
sands. 

It is demonstrated in a still more striking manner, 
in the universal changes they produced in the surface 
in the upheaval and dislocation of the strata, and the 
elevation of the hills and mountains. These great 
effects are now referred by geologists universally to 
subterranean fires, or the evolution of heat by processes 
causing an intense fusion and expansion of the mate- 
rials on which it acted ; and the energies by which 
they were wrought must have immeasurably sur- 
passed the most powerful that are now exerted in 
earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. All the expan- 
sive forces that have shaken the earth for ages united, 
would have been wholly inadequate, there is reason 
to believe, to throw up the Andes, the Himalaya, or 



EESPECTING THE FORMATION OF THE STRATA. 295 

the Alps. Tliis is admitted by many geologists, who 
nevertheless maintain that vast periods have been, 
occupied in the formatioa of the strata. 

" If now we withdraw ourselves from the turmoil of vol- 
canoes and earthquakes, and cease to measure them by the 
effects which they have produced upon our imaginations, 
we shall find that the real changes they cause on the earth's 
surface are but small, and quite irreconcilable with those 
theories which propose to account for the elevation of vast 
mountain ranges, and for enormous and sudden dislocations 
of strata, by repeated earthquakes acting invariably in the 
same line, thus raising the mountains by successive starts of 
five or ten feet at a time, or by catastrophes of no greater 
importance than a modern earthquake. It is useless to 
appeal to time; time can effect no more than its powers are 
capable of performing ; if a mouse be harnessed to a large 
piece of ordnance, it will never move it, even if centuries on 
centuries could be allowed ; but attach, the necessary force, 
and the resistance is overcome in a minute." — H. T. De 
Lcb BecMs Manual, p. 131. 

The vast changes indeed that have been produced 
on the earth's surface, so far transcend the forces that 
are now in activity, as to render the supposition that 
they have resulted from their operation, an extrava- 
gance unworthy of the support of men of judgment 
and science. 

This great postulate of their theory is thus, like the 



296 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

other, wholly irreconcilable with the facts of geology, 
and the laws of chemical and mechanical forces. So 
far from having resulted from the agents that are now 
producing changes on the crust of the globe, and act- 
ing with their present energy, all the great processes 
by which the principal rocks, from the earliest to the 
latest, have been formed, have sprung from causes 
and conditions that were peculiar to the epochs when 
they were produced, and are no longer in existence ; 
while the energy exerted at former periods by some 
of the agents that ai'e now in activity, and the spaces 
on which they acted, were immeasurably greater than 
at present. The overthrow of that postulate involves 
the confutation accordingly of the inference founded 
on it of the vast age of the world. As the strata can- 
not have been formed by the feeble agents and slow 
processes which that postulate represents, the inade- 
quacy of those agents to a rapid production of such 
stupendous effects, is no proof that immeasurable 
periods — which would add nothing to the strength or 
efficiency of such causes — must have been occupied 
in their production. That an insect would be unable 
to drag a heavy mass of matter from its place, though 
the effort was prolonged for countless ages, presents 
no ground for the conclusion that a similar period 
would be required for its removal by an elephant or 
a steam locomotive. Yet it is on such a transparent 
fallacy that the whole deduction proceeds of the vast 



EESPECTING THE FOKMATION OF THE STRATA. 297 

age of the world, from the tardy rate at which geolo- 
gical causes are now giving birth to their several 
effects. 

These main foundations of their theory being thus 
overthrown, the only ground that remains for its sup- 
port, is that which is supposed to be furnished by the 
vegetable and animal relics that are imbedded in the 
strata. But their inference from them of the great 
age of the world, is equally unauthorized and unphi- 
losophical. 

In the first place, it is, like their other arguments, 
founded, in a great measure, on their theory of the 
agents and processes by which the strata were formed ; 
not on the nature, condition, or mass of those relics 
themselves ; and is built, therefore, on an assumption 
of the point which it professes to demonstrate. 

In the next place : Neither the masses of those fos- 
silized relics, nor the conditions in which they are pre- 
served, present any decisive, or probable evidence 
that the immense periods which geologists assume 
were occupied in their growth and deposition. In 
respect to the coal formations, for example, lignites, 
and other vegetable fossils, the supposition of vast 
periods is not requisite at all to account for the growth 
of sufficient masses of vegetables to constitute such 
deposits. The vegetables existing on the globe at a 
single epoch, were they gathered into spaces com- 
mensurate with those that are occupied by the miner 

13^ 



298 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

ralized vegetables, are enough, not improbably, to 
constitute deposits of equal bulk. Tbe difficulty, 
accordingly, of accounting for their vast dimensions, 
does not lie at all in their quantity, but in their tran- 
sportation to the places of their deposition. But that 
is not obviated in any degree, by the supposition that 
great periods were occupied in its accomplishment. 
That supposition, indeed, is forbidden by the condi- 
tion of the coal strata. That the leaves, stems, and 
trunks, of which they are formed, neither grew in the 
places of their deposition, nor were transported there 
gi*adually through a series of ages, is clear from the 
fact that they had undergone no decay, but retained 
their structure and forms uninjured when the process 
of their fossilization commenced. Had a long period 
passed during the accumulation of a sti-atum, those 
that were first deposited would have been decompo- 
sed, and changed into vegetable mould. The lowest 
layers, however, of beds that are ten, twelve, or four- 
teen feet in thickness, exhibit no traces of such a de- 
composition. The forms of the stems and leaves are 
there as distinct and perfect as in the layers at the 
upper surface. Had they been transported, and 
slowly accumulated there by streams and currents 
charged by detritus from continents or islands, there 
would have been a large mixture in them of eartliy 
particles, such as now takes place in the deposition of 
trees, plants, and leaves at the mouths of rivers. But 



RESPECTING THE FOEMATION OF THE STRATA. 299 

no such foreign ingredients are intermingled with 
them. The main beds consist, throughout their whole 
mass, of pure vegetable matter. These facts demon- 
strate, therefore, both that thej were transported from 
other sites, and that their accumnlation, deposition, 
and the first steps of their fossilization, were accom- 
plished with great rapidity. 

l^or are vast periods any more necessary to account 
for the animal relics that are buried in the strata. So 
far from it, the slightness of these remains presents a 
resistless demonstration that no such incalculable series 
of ages, as geologists assume, can have elapsed during 
their deposition. It is infinitely incredible, had the 
ocean and extensive continents and islands, been peo- 
pled through such immeasurable periods as thickly 
as they now are, that their relics would not have been 
imbedded in vastly greater numbers and masses in 
the strata. This is too apparent to admit of dispute 
in respect to all vertebrate animals, both of the land 
and the sea. If all the relics of those classes that 
have hitherto been found in different localities, are 
taken as a measure of the quantity that lies buried 
throughout the globe in the strata to which they be- 
long, the whole mass can scarcely exceed the number 
that subsists at the present epoch — certainly not the 
crowds that people the land and sea in the lapse of 
one or two centuries. Of this any one may convince 
himself, who considers how countless the multitudes 



300 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

were of the wild animals that lived on this continent 
three centimes ago, or how innumerable they and 
the flocks and herds of tame animals are at the pre- 
sent period : what infinite hosts of fish people the 
waters of the torrid zone ; and what armies of cod, 
mackerel, herring, and other tribes swarm at certain 
seasons on the Qoasts of 'New England, ]N"ew Bruns- 
wick, and ISTova Scotia. Multitudes equivalent to 
these, a few times repeated, would equal, there is rea- 
son to believe, the whole of like classes that are 
entombed in the strata. The difficulty in accounting 
for their deposition, accordingly arises, not from the 
greatness, but rather from the slightness of their num- 
bers, compared to the period during which they may 
have been accumulating. Two or three centuries 
seem as adequate to their production as fifteen or 
twenty. 

Such is the fact also with the relics of testaceous 
and infusorial animals, which exist on a scale, and are 
multiplied with a rapidity as much greater propor- 
tionally, than the vertebrate classes, as their dimen- 
sions are less than theirs. The seas along the shores 
in every part of the globe, but especially in the equa- 
torial and temperate climes, swarm with infinite hosts 
of testaceous animals. Thus Mr. Darwin relates : 

" The kelp " of the sea in high southern latitudes, some- 
times — " grows to the length of sixty fathoms aud upwards. 



KESPECTING THE FORMATION OF TIIE STRATA. 301 

. . . Captain Fitz Roy found it growing up from the depth 
of forty-five fathoms. 

" The number of living creatures of all orders whose exist- 
ence intimately depends on the kelp, is wonderful. A great 
volume might be written describing the inhabitants of one 
of these beds of sea-weed. Almost all the leaves, except 
those that float on the surface, are so thickly incrusted with 
corallines as to be of a white color. We find exquisitely 
delicate structures, some inhabited by simple hydra-like 
polypi, others by more organized kinds, and beautiful com- 
pound Ascidise. On the leaves also, various patelliform 
shells, trochi, uncovered molluscs, and some bivalves, are 
attached. Innumerable Crustacea frequent every part of 
this plant. On shaking the great entangled roots, a pile of 
small fish, shells, cuttlefish, ' crabs of all orders, sea-eggs, 
star-fish, beautiful holuthurnise, planarise, and crawling 
nereidous animals of a multitude of forms, all fall out 
together. Often as I recurred to a branch of the kelp, I 
never failed to discover animals of new and curious struc- 
tures." — Darwin^s Voyage of the Beagle, p. 240. 

But the infusorial tribes pervade tlie waters at 
every point, and in some localities on a scale in num- 
bers as far transcending tliat of the larger animals as 
their bulk is less. They swarm in such incalculable 
multitudes in some localities, as to give their color to 
the whole mass of the water over large areas. 

" During a run of fifty leagues, the sea was constantly of 
an olive green color, remarkably turbid, but it then changed 



S02 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

to a transparent blue. The green appearance of the sea in 
these latitudes I formerly ascertained to be occasioned by an 
innumerable quantity of small molluscous animals of a yel- 
lowish color contained in it. A calculation of the number 
of these animals in a space of two miles square and 220 
fathoms deep, gave an amount of 23,888,000,000,000."— 
Scoresby^s Journal of a Voyage to the Northern Whale Fish- 
ery, 1822, p. 18. See also pp. 351, 353. 

" We entered on a zone where the whole sea was covered 
with prodigious quantities of medusas. The vessel was 
almost becalmed, but the moUuscEe were borne towards the 
southeast with a rapidity four times that of the current. 
Their passage lasted near three-quarters of an hour. We 
then perceived but a few scattered individuals following the 
crowd at a distance, as if tired with the journey." — Hum- 
loldt^s Narrative, vol. i., p. 12. 

These and otlier forms of infusorial animals existed 
not improbably in far greater multitudes at those 
epochs in the formation of the strata, when the waters 
of the seas were charged alternately with mncli 
greater quantities than at present of silex and lime. 
The vast scale on which they exist, and the rapidity 
with which they succeed each other, is such, there- 
fore, that instead of a long series of ages being requi- 
site to account for the masses in which they are accu- 
mulated in certain localities, it would be inexplicable 
had such incalculable periods passed, that their relics 
had not risen to an immeasurably greater bulk. The 



EESPECTING THE FOEMATION OF THE STRATA. 303 

cause, if supposed to act tlirougli an innumerable 
series of ages, would as far transcend tlie magnitude 
of the effect, as the vertebrate and testaceous animals 
of such incalculable periods would exceed in number 
the relics of their classes that are imbedded in the 
strata. 

The whole ground on which they have founded 
their induction of the great age of the globe, is thus 
swept from beneath them. They not only have not 
established their theory by legitimate and adequate 
proofs ; they have not advanced a solitary considera- 
tion that yields it support. Their whole argument 
proceeds on postulates that are gratuitously assumed, 
and that are in blank contradiction botlf to all the 
great facts of the science and the laws themselves of 
matter. That so mistaken a system should have 
gained the assent and advocacy of so large a body of 
studious and talented men, is truly a matter of asto- 
nishment. The fact, indeed, that they universally 
and unhesitatingly concur in assigning a vast period 
to the formation of the strata, is sometimes alleged as 
a proof of the validity and amplitude of the evidence 
on which their judgment is founded. The unanimity 
and ardor with which tliey maintain it, and the dis- 
quietude and not infrequently discourtesy with which 
they receive a doubt of its truth, are certainly remark- 
able. Their concurrence, however, is seen to be 
entitled to but little weight, when it is considered 



304: FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS 

that it is almost absolutely confined to this branch of 
their speculations — that there is not another question 
in the whole range of their system, in regard to which 
they do not entertain a wide diversity of opinion. 
They are not agreed, for example, whether the world, 
at its creation, was in a gaseous or in a solid form. 
They are not agreed in respect to the processes by 
which granite, gneiss, schist, and the other primary 
rocks were produced. They are not agreed in respect 
to the point at which the secondary series commences, 
the order of the strata, the sources from which some 
of their elements were drawn, nor the agencies to 
which they owe their peculiar structure. They differ 
in respect Ifo the point at which vegetable and animal 
life commenced, and the forms which it first assumed. 
They entertain the most diverse and absurd opinions 
respecting the origin of limestone, coal, gypsum, chalk, 
magnesia, iron, and salt. They hold confiicting views 
in regard to the state of the globe at the epoch of the 
different formations, the forces by which the strata 
were dislocated, the causes by which the mountains 
were upthrown, the period at which land animals 
were first called into existence, and the origin of the 
races that now inhabit the globe. They differ like- 
wise, to the extent of countless ages, in regard to the 
period that has elapsed during the formation of the 
strata. In short, beyond the simple facts that the 
strata have been formed since the creation of the earth, 



EESrECTmO THE FORMATION OF THE STEATA. 305 

that cliemical and meclianical forces of some kind 
were the principal agents in tlieir deposition, and that 
the fossilized forms that are imbedded in them once 
belonged to the vegetable and animal worlds — there 
is scarce a topic of any moment in the whole circle 
of the science, in respect to which they do not main- 
tain very diverse opinions ; there is scarce a solitary 
point so fully ascertained as to be placed beyond 
doubt. Tlieir unanimity in assigning a vast round of 
ages to the world, while they thus disagree in repect 
to tlie nature of the processes to which they suppose 
those incalculable ages were requisite, instead there- 
fore of giving strength to their induction, indicates 
that the grounds on which it rests are mistaken. 
What can be more absurd than to suppose that an 
inference erected on such a mere mass of gratuitous 
assumptions and disputable theories, can be entitled 
to the rank of a philosophic induction ? What can 
be more preposterous than to dignify a branch of 
knowledge in which there is so little that is settled, 
and so much that is in debate, with the lofty title of 
an accurate science ? It cannot, as a whole, rise any 
higher, in a demonstrative relation, than the parts of 
which it consists ; the conclusion cannot acquire any 
greater validity, than the postulates possess from 
which it is drawn. 

They have not then, as their theory represents, 
unfolded and established a series of facts that are at 



306 FALSE THEOEIES OF GEOLOGISTS. - 

variance with the scriptural history of the creation, 
and that render it certain that the earth had, at the 
epoch at which that dates its existence, ah'cady sub- 
sisted through innumerable ages ; nor is there any- 
thing in their discoveries that detracts in the least 
from that inspired narrative. So far from it, as their 
speculations are built throughout on hypoth(?ses, not 
upon facts ; as their inference is drawn from supposi- 
titious conditions and imagined j^i'ocesses, not from 
causes and conditions that are real and capable of 
being verified; the fancy that they liave convicted 
the sacred record of error, and demonstrated the vast 
age which they assign to the world by unanswerable 
evidence, is as groundless and mistaken as it were to 
imagine that the scriptural account of the creation is 
confuted by Buffon's hypothesis, or that ISTewton's 
theory of the motions of the planets is overthrown by 
Descartes' fancied vortices. The history of the crea- 
tion in Genesis remains untouched. If it is to be 
controverted, it must be by proofs, not by assump- 
tions ; by arguments founded on a real, not on a 
supposititious world. When, however, the question 
of its truth is tried by its proper criteria, it will be 
found — as we shall show, — that instead of being 
confuted, it is corroborated by all the facts of the 
strata, and all the laws that govern the action of 
geological forces. 



FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS. 307 

QUESTIONS. 

What is the second objection to the theory respecting the uniform 
action of the causes by which the strata and other rocks that consti- 
tute the surface of the earth were formed ? If their theory were true, 
would rocks, and formations of all kinds that were produc6d in the 
early ages of the globe, continue to be produced on a similar scale 
now? Is.it a fact, however, that none of the most important classes 
of rocks are now in the process of formation? What is the first and 
most important species to which no accessions are now making? 
Describe it. What is the second? Describe it and its extent. 
What is the third? How extensive is it? AVhat other elements of 
the earth's crust are not now in the process of augmentation ? Are 
sand, gravel, and pebbles important constituents of the earth's crust? 
How were they probably formed ? Is there any reason to believe, 
that one of this infinite multitude of granules, or large masses, has 
been formed for ages ? How is it with lime ? Are there any addi- 
tions made to the mass? How is it with chalk? Was the formation 
of that, confined to a limited period ? Is that admitted and main- 
tained by geologists? How is it with rock-salt? Is that distributed 
like sandstone and limestone through the whole series of the strata ; 
or is it confined within narrow limits ? Is coal confined mainly to 
one great division of the strata, called for that reason, the carboni- 
ferous, not distributed through the whole? 

Is it apparent also, that some of the geological agents that are 
still producing effects on the earth's surface, are not now acting with 
more than a moderate share of the energy with which they exerted 
their powers during the formation of the strata? Is this admitted 
by geologists? • Is this true of the ocean? What is the first class of 
effects in respect to which this is apparent? What is the second class 
of effects in respect to which it is manifest? Is it true in regard to 
volcanic fires? Point out proofs of it. Is this admitted by geologists? 
What is the testimony of Sir T. H. De La Beche, respecting it? 
Do these several considerations show that this postulate of their 



308 FALSE THEORIES OF GEOLOGISTS. 

theory, instead of being legitimate, is inconsistent with the facts of 
geology, and the laws of matter? What else do they allege to sus- 
taia their theory of the great age of the world ? What is the first 
objection to their argument from the vegetable and animal remains 
that are buried in the strata? What is the second objection? Are 
there positive proofs in the condition of the great mass of fossilized 
vegetables, that they eannot have been accumulated and buried by a 
slow process, but must have been enveloped in the earthy matter in 
which they are interred, in vast masses at once, before decay had 
commenced? Is there any reason to suppose vast periods were 
requisite for the generation of the animals that are entombed in the 
strata ? Is the number of those relics greater than the sea and land 
might have supplied in a very few centuries? Is it not incredible that 
if millions of ages, as geologists maintain, had passed while the fos- 
siliferous strata were forming, an incalculably greater number 
would not have existed, and their relics been incorporated in the 
strata? Is not this preeminently certain in respect to the testaceous 
and infusorial tribes ? State some of the proofs that they swarm in 
infinite numbers, both in the cold and the warm latitudes ? 

Is the whole ground on which they found their inference of the 
great age of the world, thus swept from beneath them, and the whole 
fabric of their theory shown to be based upon unauthorized assump- 
tions, instead of facts ? 



THE MATERIALS OF THE STKATA. 309 



CHAPTEE XIII. 

The Materials of the Strata, derived from the Interior of the Earth. 

The great question in theoretical geology on whicli 
tlie conclusion in regard to the age of the world — 
founded on the structure of its rocky crust — depends, 
respects the sources from which the materials of the 
strata were derived. If they are held to have been 
such that immeasurable periods were required for 
their removal and deposition in their present form, 
then an existence of corresponding length is to be 
ascribed to the earth. If they are held and shown to 
have been such that but a brief period was necessary 
to their transference and arrangement in the positions 
in which they now lie, then there are no geological 
grounds for assigning it a longer existence than that 
which is ascribed to it by the Maker himself in the 
history he has given us in his word of its creation. 

"Whatever views, however, may be entertained cm 
that subject, it will be admitted by all who regard 
the earth as the work of the All-wise and Almighty 
Creator, that they were specifically designed by him, 
and the causes and conditions from which they sprang 



310 THE MATEIIIALS OF tUE STRATA 

arranged for the pnrj)ose of giving them existence 
Tliey are not the offspring of chance. They are not 
the accidental work of causes that might not have 
acted, or that might have generated a wholly different 
product, without affecting the end for which they 
were created. The marks of intelligence and bene- 
volence with which they are everywhere stamped, 
and the important office they fill in determining the 
condition of the race, forbid such a supposition. It 
is by them, in an eminent degree, that the world is 
fitted to be the residence of such an order of beings 
as men ; — beings that are fallen, that are to be 
divided into different communities, and subsist under 
separate govei-nments ; that are capable of civiliza- 
tion, of arts, of commerce, and of great advances in 
knowledge ; that are to gain the means of subsistence 
and comfort by toil and ingenuity ; and that are to 
be placed in a great diversity of conditions, that they 
may in every pi:ssible form act out their natures, and 
show the moral dispositions with which they are ani- 
mated towards God and one another. This constitu- 
tion of the earth has, accordingly, exerted a most 
decisive influence on their physical, social, and moral 
condition. It is in a very large degree because its 
crust is what it is, in the proportion of the land and 
water ; in the form and position of the continents and 
islands ; in the direction and height of mountains ; 
and in the nature and situation of rocks, soils, and 



DEEIVED FROM THE INTEKIOK OF THE EARTH. 311 

minerals, that tlie life and career of the human family 
have been what they have ; and that the condition 
of the several branches of which it consists is now 
what it is, in respect to knowledge, arts, government, 
and religion. A different arrangement of even a few 
of its features would have made it in important 
respects a different world, changed the relations to 
each other of large portions of its population, given a 
different direction to their pursuits, generated other 
empires, and issued in a different history. Had the 
Alps, for example, instead of separating Italy from 
France, divided France from Germany, it would have 
given a different caste to the whole history of ancient 
and modern Europe. Had the Himalaya, with their 
lofty table lands, in place of dividing Hindostan from 
Thibet, been interposed between Germany and Rus- 
sia, the climate, the productions, and the population 
would have been essentially changed, and the agency 
of the different tribes on one another, both in Europe 
and Central Asia, been altogether unlike what they 
have been. Had Africa, instead of projecting from 
Europe to the south, stretched to the west, and joined 
this continent, it would have given a different turn, 
in a great degree, to the affairs of the whole world. 
America might then have. been known, perhaps, to 
both Europe and Asia many ages ago ; and been 
invaded by hostile armies from Africa, or Africa been 
conquered by the tribes of this western world. Eu- 



312 THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA 

rope and the Atlantic side of I^orth America would 
then have been isolated from the southern part of the 
globe, and could have had no such commerce, and 
thence no such arts, and therefore no such eminence 
in wealth, cultivation, and power, as they now enjoy. 
Had South America extended to the Pole, and had 
the islands that lie southward from Malacca joined 
that peninsula, and rising into a continent stretched 
down to the region of perpetual ice, the three great 
southern oceans would have been isolated ; there 
then could have been no circumnavigation of the 
globe, and consequently there could have been no 
general commerce. 

The existence also of such strata as constitute the 
surface of continents and islands, and their upheaval 
and dislocation in their present form, have had an 
almost equal influence on the pursuits and character 
of the nations that occupy them. Had it not been 
for the metals that were imbedded in them, there 
could have been neither arts nor commerce. Had it 
not been, for example, for the tin, iron, lime, and coal 
that were deposited beneath the soil of Great Britain, 
she could neither have had such an agriculture, such 
manufactures, nor such navigation. Had not the 
strata in which they and other important minerals 
are lodged, been elevated from their original posi- 
tion, broken into fragments, and exposed at the 
surface, they would have remained unknown, or from 



DEKIVED FEOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 313 

their inaccessibleness been without use ; and she 
would have had but a barren soil and a scanty and 
uncultured population. It is thus by the provi- 
sion of these means from which all the implements 
and enginery, and most of the materials of the arts 
are drawn, that man is armed with his power over 
the earth and sea, and made capable of appropriating 
them to his use, and rendering them the instruments 
of subsistence, comfort, and progress in all the forms 
of cultivation. 

It is apparent, therefore, from the momentous influ- 
ence it was thus" to exert, that the investiture of the 
earth with such a surface was expressly designed by 
the Creator, and held an important place in the great 
system of measures by which it was to be prepared 
to be the habitation of men. It was an indispensable 
condition to his placing them in such situations, and 
exercising over them such a providential administra- 
tion as he has ; and thence a necessary condition to 
their being subjected to such a discipline, made capa- 
ble of such pursuits and acquisitions, and exerting 
such agencies as have constituted the great features 
of their physical, social, political, and in an important 
sense, also, their moral history. 'No part of the con- 
stitution of the world has drawn after it a more im- 
portant train of consequences. No part of it bears 
more clear and emphatic proofs that it had its origin 
in the sovereignty, wisdom, and benevolence of its 

14 



314: THE MATERIALS OF THE STBATA 

author, and held a conspicuous place in his great 
scheme, as the Ruler of the world. Whatever, then, 
the causes were of the formation of the strata, they 
are to be regarded as having been expressly assigned 
to that work, and armed with the requisite power for 
its accomplishment ; and whatever the sources were 
from which the materials of the strata were drawn, 
they were arranged by him in their several places, 
with a direct reference to the agents by which they 
were to be transferred to their present positions, and 
the uses to which they are now appropriated. The 
means and conditions were fitted to the results that 
were to be attained, w^ith the same intelligence and 
skill that mark the adaptation of other physical 
causes to the effects which God employs them to 
produce. 

This great truth is to be borne in mind in our inqui- 
ries in respect to the agents and processes to which 
the strata owe their existence. Instead of havino- 
come into being aside from the great purposes of the 
Almighty, or sprung from causes whose proper ofiice 
was to produce a different class of effects, they are 
the work of agents, and the result of conditions that 
were expressly appointed for their production, and 
that, on completing them, had accomplished their 
mission. They are themselves as absolute proofs of 
the existence and agency of such causes in such con- 
ditions, and for that end, as the world itself is of the 



DEllIVED FKOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EAKi/i. 315 

existence and agency of its cause. The fact that the 
agents by which they were produced, ceased to give 
birth to such effects, is a proof also that those agents 
are either no longer in existence, or at least no longer 
in activity in the circumstances that are requisite to 
the generation of such products. And the limitation 
of the effect to the point at which it terminates, was 
accordingly as much a matter of arrangement, as the 
agency was of the causes by which that effect was 
carried to that extent. 

"With these views, then, of the place which the 
present constitution of the globe holds in the great 
scheme of the divine administration, and the certainty 
that it is the result of causes and conditions that were 
expressly ordained to its production, let us inquire 
whence it was that the materials were derived that 
constitute the present surface of the earth, that has 
been formed since the creation of the globe itself. 

Two theories have been entertained by geologists 
on this subject. The first is that which was advanced 
by Werner, who maintained that the whole rocky 
and earthy mass of the strata was originally held in 
solution by the waters of the ocean, and was gradu- 
ally deposited by the agency of chemical and mecha- 
nical causes. But that is now universally rejected ; 
as the waters of the ocean are wholly inadequate to 
the solution of such a quantity of matter ; as there 
are no chemical forces by which such a mass and 



316 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA 

combination of elements could be at once lield in solu- 
tion in any volume of water however great ; and no 
known laws of chemical agents by which such mixed 
substances held in solution could be separated and 
assorted in such a* manner as to form strata differ- 
ing in their composition like those of the crust of 
the earth. Instead of furnishing any explanation of 
the problem which it professes to solve, it embar- 
rasses and confounds it by false assumptions and pal- 
pable contradictions to the laws of matter. 

The other theory is that now generally held, which 
represents the materials of the strata as having been 
drawn from pre-existing continents and islands of 
granite, that were gradually disintegrated, borne 
down by streams to the sea, and spread by tides and 
currents over its bottom. But this, as was shown in 
a former chapter, is equally groundless and unphiloso- 
phical ; as there are no proofs that such continents 
and islands ever existed ; while it is certain from the 
elevation which is ascribed to them, and from the 
laws that govern the disintegration and transporta- 
tion of such masses, that they cannot have been the 
source of the materials from which the strata were 
formed. 

But if the materials of the earth were neither 
originally held in solution in the waters of the ocean, 
nor derived by disintegration from pre-existing conti- 
nents and islands, it is manifest that, at least in the 



DEKH^ED FROM THE INTEEIOE OF THE EARTH. 317 

main, they must liave been drawn from the interior 
of the globe. We shall, accordingly, endeavor, to 
show that that was their origin ; and that it super- 
sedes the necessity of assigning to the earth any 
earlier date than that which is ascribed to it by the 
history in Genesis of the creation and deluge. 

In order to accomplish this, it is not necessary that 
we should demonstrate divectlj from the strata them- 
selves, that they were thrown up from the depths of 
the earth, and arranged in their present form within 
the period that is implied in the Mosaic history of the 
world from its creation to the remodification of its 
surface at the deluge. All that it is requisite for us 
to prove, is "simply that it was compatible with the 
laws of nature, and therefore possible and probable; 
as that being shown, the consistency of the facts of 
geology with the Scriptures is established. And that 
we shall accomplish by proving first, that all the 
ingredients that enter into the composition of the 
different species of rocks and soils, originally existed 
in masses in the interior of the earth ; next, that vast 
volumes of them have been thrown up from the 
depths where they were first placed, and become 
parts of the present surface of the earth; and thirdly, 
that there have been agents in the proper conditions, 
and of sufficient force, to have ejected the whole body 
of the sedimentary strata, and within the periods 
during which, according to the sacred narrative, they 



318 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA 

must have been formed. If these points are estab- 
lished, as the formation of the strata will be shown 
to have been practicable within the period that 
elapsed from the creation to the change of the earth's 
surface at the period of the deluge, no ground will 
exist in the strata themselves, for referring the crea- 
tion of the world to an earlier date than that which 
is assigned it by the sacred history. This we shall, 
accordingly, now proceed to prove. 

In the first place, then, there is the most ample cer- 
tainty that all the various substances that enter into 
the composition of the present surface of the earth 
existed originally, and still exist within its depths. 
The chief of those substances are silica, alumine, lime, 
soda, potash, iron, magnesia. Of these, silica exists 
in far the greatest quantity ; constituting, probably, 
at least one-half of the whole mass of the rocks and 
soils. Its proportion in granite is usually about 
seventy-five per cent., to thirteen or fourteen of alu- 
mine, eight or nine of potash, nearly two of iron, a 
trace of lime, and one or two other ingredients. This 
rock is now universally regarded as having been 
thrown up from beneath the primai-y stratified depo- 
sits, and must have come, therefore, in a large mea- 
sure from a depth in the earth, and demonstrates 
accordingly the existence in its interior of the several 
elements that enter into its composition. Felspar, 
mica, and hornblende, instead of simple minerals, are 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 319 

formed by the union of those elements in different 
proportions. In felspar there are of 



Silica, 


. . 64-04 


Potash, 


- 


. 13-€6 


Alumina, . 


18-94 


Lime, 


. 


0-7C 




Oxide of iron, 


. 


0-74 





In hornblende, the proportions are usually 



Silica, 


. . 45-69 


Magnesia, 


lS-79 


Alumina, . 


. . 12-18 


Protoxide of iron, 


7-32 


Lime, 


13-S3 


of magnesia, 


0-22 




Fluoric acid. 


1-.50-* 





Several of these elements, however, enter in much 
larger proportions into the composition of lavas. 
Thus of the felspathic minerals in volcanic rocks, 
there are in 

Silica. Alumine. Lime. Magnesia. Soda. Iicn. 

it.i jn ff. r,~ ,n -.n nn I 8-0(1 a trace of iron, mag- 

Anorthite, 43-79 3o-49 18-93 \ nesia, soda, and potash. 

Labradorite, 53-48 26-46 9-49 1-U 4-10 1-60 and a trace of potash- 

Andesin, 59-60 24-28 5-77 ]-00 6-53 1-58 1-08 potash. 

Albite, 69-36 19.26 046 10-50 0-43 

Orthoclase, 65-72 18-57 0S5 1-25 14-02 « 

Adularia, 65-59 17-97 1-34 1-01 13-99 " t 

In the volcanic rocks or lavas themselves these in- 
gredients exist in still different proportions. Tlius in 
trachytes and other volcanic rocks, silica ranges from 
49-21 to Y3-46 ; alumina from 12-04 to 20-80 ; iron 

* H. T. Dc La Beche's Geol. Observer, pp. 34, 35. 
t H. T. De La Beche's Geological Observer, p, 352. Daubaey'a 
Description of Yolcanoes, p. 13. 



820 THE MATERIALS OF THE 8TEATA, 

from 1-4:9 to 11.84 ; lime from 0*45 to 8*83 ; magnesia 
from 0*39 to 7*96 ; potash from 1*42 to T'16 ; and soda 
from 4*29 to 7'98j with sometimes a trace of manga- 
nese."'^ 

In the recent lava of Kilauea, Hawaii, silica ranges 
from 39*74 to 69-80 ; protoxide of iron from 16-91 to 
33-62 ; and soda from 4*83 to 21-62.t 

In basalt, silica ranges from 44*50 to 59-5 ; alu- 
mina from 11-5 to 17*56 : iron from 4'64 to 204 

In all these volcanic rocks, which it is universally 
held are ejected from deep abysses in the earth, all 
the great elementary substances of which the strata 
consist are thus conspicuous ingredients. They pre- 
sent the most decisive proofs, therefore, that the vari- 
ous substances that enter into the composition of the 
strata were placed by the Creator originally in masses 
in the interior of the earth. 

But besides the place which lime holds in these 
volcanic rocks, it has in some instances been thrown 
up in masses from the interior of the planet. Thus 
Mr. Emmons describes many veins, dykes, and larger 
bodies in the northern section of this State that are 
undoubtedly of igneous origin. 

" The origin of primitive limestone, I apprehend, is pre- 
cisely the same as that of all the granitic compounds. It is 

* De La Beche's Geol. Observer, p. 353. 

t Dana's Geology of the U. S. Ex. Exped., p. 200. 

X De La Beche's Geol. Observer, p. 396. 



DEEIVED FROM THE INTERIOE OF THE EARTH. 321 

not as some, perhaps, would be ready to suggest, produced 
by the overflowing of a molten mass of granite on a sedi- 
mentary limestone, thereby decomposing it ; and by which 
portions the most intensely acted on would be raised in a 
vaporous state, and made to penetrate the mass of cooling 
granite above. Geologists, in speaking of limestone, seem 
to be averse to the admission that it may form a j>ortion of 
ike interior of the earth, or even to admit that it may exist 
there at all ; but there seems not a particle of sound reason 
against the doctrine that it may be as common in the earth 
as silex, or any of the simple or compound rocks. There is, 
in fact, more reason to make this inference, for many of the 
phenomena of nature speak of its being, and proclaim its 
existence. From what I have seen of it, I am disposed to 
consider it as one of the igneous products, having its origin 
in a mode corresponding to all the unstratified rocks, and 
differing from them merely in the materials of which it is 
composed." — Emmons's Geology of the 2d District of New 
York, p. 26. 

He accordiogly cites a number of localities in 
which large masses, dykes, and veins of limestone 
project up from beneath into granite, in such a man- 
ner as to render it indisputable that they were forced- 
from below in a state of fusion like the veins and 
dykes of granite, quartz, trap, and other species that 
have been driven up from beneath by heat into the 
primary and secondary formations. 

Iron, also, has been ejected from the interior of the 
14* 



322 THE MATEKIAXS OF THE STKATA 

earth in masses, as is seen from its existence in rocks 
that are of igneous origin. Thus of the magnetic 
oxide Mr. Emmons states : 

*' Masses of ore appeared to be coeval with the rock 
which incloses them ; or such a yiew comports best with 
many facts and phenomena which are brought to light in 
mining. If this is sustained by future investigations, it will 
necessarily follow that the original formation must have 
been influenced by the same agents as those which were 
concerned in the production or modification of the materials 
composing the rock. The' rock which incloses the ore is 
clearly unstratified ; from which we are also to infer the 
igneous origin of the inclosed mass of ore. We are clearly 
driven off from every other mode of formation : the theory 
of electro-magnetic agency appears out of the question." — 
Emmons's Geology of the 2d District of New York, _p. 90. 

Other passages might be quoted from him and 
others, that present the same fact. "We have thus 
the most indisputable proofs that all the great ele- 
ments of the strata — silex, alumine, lime, potash, 
soda, magnesia, and iron — existed originally in the 
interior of the earth. The materials were lodo-ed 
there on a vast scale, for the formation bj their trans- 
ferrence to the surface of precisely such composite 
rocks as those which now constitute the covering of 
the globe. 

Immense masses of these substances that were 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 323 

originally deposited in the depths of tlie interior, 
have actually been ejected to the surface, and now 
form a part of the earth's rocky vesture. Thus all 
the unstratified rocks — ^granite, porphyry, greenstone, 
serpentine, hypersthene, basalt, and all the varieties 
of trap, as well as the lavas and tuff of modern 
volcanoes, are universally admitted to be of igneous 
origin, and to have been elevated from the interior 
of the earth; and they together constitute a very 
considerable part of the crust that rises above the 
level of the sea. The Andes of South America, for 
example, extending from the Isthmus to Cape Horn, 
with a breadth of from 30 or 40 to 600 miles, cover, 
it is supposed, about one sixth of that continent, and 
rising from three or four thousand to fifteen or eigh- 
teen thousand feet, irrespective of the highest peaks, 
have undoubtedly — with the ranges that lie eastward 
of them in Yenezuela, at the sources of the Oronoco, 
and in Brazil — several times the bulk of the other 
parts of the continent that lie above the line of the 
ocean ; and they consist mainly of granite, porphyry, 
trachyte, andesite, basalt, and other igneous rocks, of 
which silex, alumine, lime, iron, potash, and soda, 
are the chief constituents. All these immense masses 
were thrown up to the surface, it should be consid- 
ered, subsequently to the deposition of the principal 
stratified rocks ; as is seen from the fact that they bear 
on their sides and summits vast bodies of the primary, 



324: THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA 

secondary, and tertiary strata, that, anterior to their 
upheaval, were spread over the areas, at the bottom 
of the sea, the}^ now occuj)y. Their elements existed 
in the depths of the earth, therefore, at the period of 
the formation of the strata, and constituted probably 
but a small portion of the immeasurable stores that 
were there treasured up. They prove, accordingly, 
that there was at that epoch an ample stock of them 
in the recesses of the earth for the formation of the 
strata. ^N^or have they been exhausted by the vast 
quantities that 'have been transferred to the surface. 
They continue to be thrown up by all the active vol- 
canoes, and hold as large a place in the composition 
of their lavas, as in those that were ejected ages ago: 
and they continue still, there is every reason to sup- 
pose, to exist in exhaustless abundance in the interior 
of the globe. That a large share of the volcanoes 
from which they were once emitted, have sunk into 
inactivity, is owing to the exhaustion of the combus- 
tible or chemical agents in which their fires had their 
origin ; not to the want of silica, alumine, lime, soda, 
and potash, that were, it is to be presumed, the sub- 
jects on which their fires acted, rather than the direct 
cause itself of their combustion. 

We have the most ample evidence, therefore, that 
sufficient stores of them were originally treasured up 
in the depths of the earth to furnish the materials of 
the sedimentary strata. There is enough of them 



DERIVED FSOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 325 

there now — for aught that can be shown or rendered 
probable — -to furnish a similar rocky covering to a 
score of such worlds as ours. 

QUESTIONS. 

What is the great question on which the conclusion in respect to 
the age of the world depends? What condition of the sources from 
which the materials of the strata were derived, would prove that a 
long series of ages was required for their formation ? What condi- 
tion would show that they might have been formed in a brief period? 
Is the structure of the earth in its present form, to be considered as 
having been expressly ordained by the Creator and for most import- 
ant ends? Has this peculiar constitution and structure of the 
earth, exerted a great influence on the condition and life of man? 
Show how. Would a different arrangement even in a few leading 
features have made the earth a different world, to its population ? 
Exemplify it in respect to the Alps. Show what effects would have 
followed, had the Himalaya been placed between Germany and Russia. 
What effects might have resulted, had Africa, instead of projecting 
to the South, stretched Westward and joined this continent ? What 
change in navigation would have been produced, had this continent 
extended to the Southern Pole ? Has the fact that the strata consist 
of such elements as they do, and are thrown up into such positions, 
exerted a vast influence on the condition and pursuits of the human 
race ? Exemplify it in respect to Great Britain. Are these great 
features of the globe then, to be regarded as not merely casual, and 
of little significance ; but as among the most essential in the consti- 
tution of the world, in order to fit it to be the residence of such a 
race of intelligences ? Are they the work of causes that were espe- 
cially fitted for their production? And does the fact that those 
causes have long since ceased to act, show that they were commis- 
sioned to produce but a limited effect, and that that eifect has been 
accomplished ? 



326 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA 

What is the theory which Werner advanced respecting the forma- 
tion of the strata? Is that now rejected? What is the theory now 
generally held ? Is that also mistaken ? If the materials of the 
strata then, were neither originally held in solution by the waters of 
the globe, nor drawn from the surface of granite continents by disin- 
tegration, and transported to the ocean by streams : from what other 
quarter must they have been derived ? What then is the view of 
their origin which we are to maintain ? If we show that the mate- 
rials may have been thrown up from the interior of the earth, and 
with such rapidity that the strata may have been formed, betwixt 
the creation recorded in Genesis, and the deluge, or the second and 
third century after the event; will that be sufficient to vindicate the 
sacred record from the charge of being contradicted by the facts of 
the strata? 

What then is the first consideration that proves that they might 
have been formed in that period ? What are the chief substances of 
which the strata consist ? Which of these enters most largely into 
the composition of rocks and strata ? Does it exist in inexhaustible 
quantities in the interior of the earth ? In what proportion does it 
enter into the composition of granite? What other elements are 
united with silica in that rock? In what proportion do they exist in 
volcanic rocks ? Has granite, as well as the volcanic rocks, been 
thrown up from the interior of the earth? Is lime sometimes 
thrown up in masses ? State instances. Is iron also ejected from the 
depths of the earth ? Cite examples. Hav6 we then proof that all 
the main elements of which the strata consist, are lodged in vast 
masses in the recesses of the earth ? 

What is the second consideration which proves that the strata may 
have been derived from that source ? Enumerate the great classes 
of rocks that have thus been ejected from the depths of the globe ? 

What great ranges of mountains on this continent, consist mainly of 
these rocks ? When were they thrown up ; before, or subse- 
quently to the deposition of the principal series of the strata? Do 
they show that immense masses of the elements of which they consist, 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTEKIOR OF THE EARTH. 327 

must have been created by the Almighty in the deep regions of the 
earth, out of which they have been thrown to the surface ? Do these 
elements continue to be ejected by all the volcanoes that are still 
active ? Do these facts sufficiently prove that there originally were 
ample stores of them there to furnish materials for the construction 
of the strata ? 



328 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 



CHAPTEK XIY. 

The Materials of the Strata; derived from the Interior of the Earth. 

There were cliemical and meclianical agents also 
in existence and activity at that period, of sufficient 
power to transfer those materials from the depths of 
the earth to the surface, and unite them in the forms 
in which they now subsist in the strata. That such 
agents have existed and acted in the deep abysses of 
the earth where those substances were deposited, and 
with far greater energy and on a far larger scale than 
was requisite to that effect, is seen from the fact that 
it was by their action that all the mountains of the 
globe, and in a great degree the whole mass of the 
continents and islands, were raised from beneath the 
ocean to their present elevation. And the masses 
thus moved that lie beneath the line of the sea, are 
probably hundreds of times greater than those that 
rise above that line. The base of the mountains or 
bottoms of the columns that were upheaved, lie pro- 
bably many times the distance below the surface that 
their summits stretch above it. The force that was 
exerted in upheaving them was, therefore, immea- 



DEEIVED FKOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 329 

surably greater than was requisite to tlie elevation to 
the surface of the contents of any one of the strata 
that can be supposed to have been thrown up at a 
single effort. The whole mass of a mountain, how- 
ever great in weight, was to be lifted at once. Of 
the materials of a stratum forced up in a continuous 
current, like the waters of a spring or the lava of a 
volcano, only a small portion was to be supported at 
the same time. The weight at any moment, for 
example, of the column of lava borne upwards in the 
cavity of Etna or Hecla, at a period of the most 
violent eruption, is but that of a feather to the moun- 
tain itself, compared to the vast and inconceivable 
w^eight that was uplifted at the elevation of the Alps 
from the fathomless abysses of the earth in which 
their massy granites were elaborated. The lofty pin- 
nacles and mounds of that range are themselves, 
indeed, but trifles, probably, in comparison of the 
vast bed extending down an immense depth in which 
they are rooted, that must have been elevated at the 
same moment along with them. Agents, then, have 
in fact been acting in the depths of the planet, and 
elevating the substances deposited there to the sur- 
face, that were of even greater energy than is ordina- 
rily exerted in volcanoes, and than was necessary to 
the gradual ejection of the materials of the strata in 
the long series of ages that was occupied in their for- 
mation. 



330 



The forces, however, that are exerted in volcanic 
eruptions, and the volume of matter ejected by them 
on the surface in brief periods, is sometimes immense. 
Thus the current of lava thrown up in 1783 by Skap- 
tar Jokul, one of the principal volcanoes of Iceland, 
was like that of a great river, and s4>on filled up deep 
valleys and spread over extensive plains. 

" On the 11th of June, Skaptar Jokul threw out a tor- 
rent of lava which flowed down into the river Skapta and 
completely dried it up. The channel of the river was 
between high rocks, in many places from 400 to 600 feet in 
depth, and near 200 in breadth. Not only did the lava fill 
up this great defile to the brink, but it overflowed the adja- 
cent fields to a considerable extent. The burning flood, on 
issuing from the rocky gorge, was then arrested for some 
time by a deep lake which formerly existed in the course of 
the river between Skaptardal and Aa, which it entirely 
filled. ... On the 18th of June, another ejection of 
this liquid lava rushed from the volcano, which flowed down 
with amazing velocity over the surface of the first stream. 
By the damming up of the mouths of some of the tributa- 
ries of the Skapta, many villages were completely over- 
flowed with water, and thus great destruction of property 
was caused. The lava, after flowing for several days, was 
precipitated down a tremendous cataract called Stapafoss, 
where it filled a profound abyss, which that great waterfall 
had been hollowing out for ages, and after this the fiery 
current again continued its course. 



DEKIVED FKOM THE INTERIOE OF THE Ex\IiTH. 331 

" On the 2d of August, fresh floods of kiva still pouring 
from the volcano, a new branch was sent off in a new direc- 
tion ; for the channel of the Skapta was now so entirely- 
choked up, and every opening to the west and north so 
obstructed, that the melted matter was forced to take a 
new course, so that ii: ran in a southeast direction, and 
discharged itself into the bed of the river Haverfisfliot, 
where a scene of destruction scarcely inferior to the former 
was occasioned. These Icelandic lavas — like the ancient 
streams that are met with in Auvergne and other provinces 
of central France — are stated to have- accumulated to a 
prodigious depth in narrow rocky gorges ; but where they 
came to wide alluvial plains, they spread themselves out 
into broad burning lakes, sometimes from twelve to fifteen 
miles wide, and one hundred feet deep. When the fiery 
lake which filled up the lower portion of the valley of the 
Skapta had been augmented by new supplies, the lava 
flowed up the course of the river to the foot of the hills 
from whence the Skapta takes its rise. . . . The erup- 
tion did not entirely cease till the end of two years. 

" The extraordinary volume of the melted matter produced 
in this eruption, deserves the particular attention of the 
geologist. Of the two branches which flowed in nearly 
opposite directions, the greater was fifty, and the lesser 
forty miles in length. The extreme breadth which the 
Skapta branch attained in the low countries, was from 
twelve to fifteen miles ; that of the other about seven. The 
ordinary height of both currents was 100 feet, but in narrow 
defiles it sometimes amounted to 600." — LyeWs Principles, 
vol. i., pp. 342-344. 



332 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

The matter tlirown out of this volcano principally 
in a few dajs of a single season, was tlms enough 
probably to spread a stratum ten or twelve feet in 
thickness over six or seven thousand square miles. 

The eruptions from Kilauea, Hawaii, are also on a 
vast scale : 

*' The discharge from the large lake during the night of 
the 11th, must have been equal to fifteen million, cubic feet 
of melted rock. This undoubtedly found cavities to receive 
it on the line of the eruption. It is impossible to calculate 
the discharge from the smaller, or Judd's lake, but supposing 
it had continued as rapid as it was at the first filling, it 
would have thrown out, by the time I was there next day, 
upwards of two hundred million cubic feet of lava. It will 
readily be perceived, with such a flood, it would be possible 
within the lapse of a period comparatively short, geologi- 
cally speaking, for a mound the size of Mauna Loa to be 
heaped up. However large the above numbers may seem 
to be, we have reason to suppose from appearances, that the 
*boihng up' and overflow of the terminal crater of Mauna 
Loa must have been far greater ; so much so, indeed, that 
the outpourings of Kilauea cannot bear a comparison with 
it. Its whole height of more than six thousand feet above 
the plain of lava, appears to be entirely owing to the accu- 
mulation of ejected matter." — Wilkes^ s Narrative of the IT. 
S. Exploring Expedition, vol. iv., p. 178. 

In an eruption which commenced on the 30th of 
May, 1840, and continued thi-ee weeks, a far greater 
mass was ejected. 



DERIVED FEOM THE mTEEIOR OF THE EARTH. 333 

" The first appearance of the lava at the surface occurred 
in a small crater about six miles from Kilauea. The next 
day another outbreak was distinguished farther towards the 
coast. Other openings followed, and by Monday, the 1st 
of June, the large flow had begun which formed a continu- 
ous stream to the sea, where it reached on the 3d of June, 
destroying the small villatge of Nanawale. This flood issued 
from several fissures along its whole course, instead of being 
an overflow of lavas from a single opening ; the lowest being 
at an elevation of 1,244 feet, as determined by Captain 
Wilkes, at a point twenty-seven miles distant from Kilauea, 
twenty-two miles from the first outbreak, and twelve from 
the shores. ■ . . 

" The lavas rolled on sometimes sluggishly and sometimes 
violently, receiving at times fresh force from new accessions 
to the fiery stream, and then almost ceasing its motion. It 
swept away forests in its course, at times parting and 
inclosing islets of earth and shrubbery, and at other times 
undermining and bearing away masses of rock and vegeta- 
tion on its surface. Einally, it plunged into the sea with 
loud detonations. The burning lava on meeting the waters 
was shivered, like melted glass, into millions of particles, 
which were thrown up in clouds that darkened the sky, and 
fell like a storm of hail over the surrounding country. Yast 
columns of steam and vapors rolled off before the wind, 
whirling in ceaseless agitation, and the reflected glare of the 
lavas formed a fiery firmament overhead. For three weeks 
this terrific river disgorged itself into the sea with little 
abatement. Night was converted into day on all eastern 



334: THE :mateirials of the strata, 

Hawaii. The light rose and spread like morning upon the 
mountains, and its glare was seen on the opposite side of the 
island. It was distinctly visible for more than one hundred 
miles at sea, and at the distance of forty miles fine print 
could be read at midnight. . . . 

"From the period, thirty-six hours, which the lava 
required to reach the sea, an average velocity of four hun- 
dred feet an hour is readily deduced, as stated by Captain 
Wilkes. Yet as the lavas issued from various fissures along 
the course, the result cannot be correctly compared to an 
overfiow of fluid ; it is rather the rate of progress of the 
eruption than of the motion of a flowing liquid. 

" The thickness of the stream of lava was estimated by 
Dr. Pickering as averaging ten or twelve feet. In some 
places it was not over six feet. The whole area, judging 
from the surveys, covers about fifteen square statute miles ; 
and reduced to feet, and multiplying by the depth, 12 feet, 
gives, for the amount of ejected lava, 5,018,000,000 cubic 
feet ; to which, if we add for the previous ejections of the 
same eruption, three more square miles, it gives 6,023,000,000 
of cubic feet for the whole amount of lavas which reached 
the surface.* 

" We have a still more accurate means of estimating the 
amount of lavas which passed from Kilauea, in the actual 

* This calculation, however, if we understand it, respects only the 
mass of the lava that remains on the surface between Kilauea and the 
shore. It takes no notice of the vast cataract that plunged into the 
ocean during the three weeks of the eruption. If that were taken 
into the account, the whole sum that was ejected would be seen to be 
immensely greater than this estimate. 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 335 

cubic contents of the emptied pit. The area of the lower 
pit, as determined by the surveys of the Expedition, is equal 
to 38,500,000 square feet. Multiply this by 400 feet, the 
depth of the pit after the eruption, we have 15,400,000,000 
cubic feet for the solid contents of the space occupied by 
lavas before the eruption, and, therefore, the actual amount 
of the material which flowed from Kilauea. This is two and 
a half times the amount obtained from the estimated extent 
of the eruptions. The difference may be accounted for 
partly, on the ground that fissures were filled as well as sur- 
faces overflowed, and also that there may have been erup- 
tions beneath the sea not estimated.'^' This amount is 
equivalent to a triangular ridge eight hundred feet high, 

* Here there is an omission also from the estimate, of that portion 
of the lava that was precipitated into the sea. It is assumed also 
that no lava was ejected except what was drawn from Kilauea ; and 
that no accessions were made to the stock in that reservoir during the 
progress of the eruption by fresh emissions from the abysses beneath ; 
the first of which was possible and the last certain, and on a great scale. 
The estimate must necessarily be in a large degree conjectural ; but 
if conformed to the data furnished by Captain Wilkes, must greatly 
transcend Mr. Dana's calculation. Captain Wilkes represents the 
breadth of the stream at its entrance into the ocean as three-fourths 
of a mile, or 3,960 feet; and the rush o^the current to the sea as at 
the rate of 400 feet an hour. Let us suppose the breadth of the 
column precipitated into the sea to have been 3,500 feet, its average 
depth 10 feet, and the length of the current that made the plunge in 
twenty-four hours, 9,000 feet ; the mass, at that rate, precipitated 
into the ocean in twenty days, would be 6,300,000,000 cubic feet ; to 
which, if the mass remaining on the surface, as estimated by Mr. 
Dana, 5,018,000,000, be added, they will form an aggregate of 
11,318,000,000 cubic feet. If to these the proportion he supposes to 
have been absorbed by fissures be added, the whole sum will be near 
20,000,000,000. 



336 THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA, 

two miles loDg, and over a mile wide at base." — Dana^s 
Geology of the U. S. Ex. Exj^edition, pp. 188-192. 

The materials of tlie strata, however, were not 
thrown up from the interior in the form of lava — as they 
exhibit no marks of fusion — but of mud or a liquid 
tide, much like that, probably, which is ejected by 
the mud volcanoes of Italy, South America, and the 
Crimea. It seems probable that the first volcanic 
ejections were neither in the form of molten lava, nor 
attended with flames or excessive heat. If materials 
like those of the granitic masses which now constitute 
the general floor on which the stratified and volcanic 
rocks rest, originally formed the exterior of the globe, 
as their crystallization has taken place since their 
creation, they may be supposed to have existed at 
first in the form of particles, and were not improba- 
bly at the surface promiscuously mingled with each 
other, so as to form on the first continents and islands, 
a proper soil for the plants which were made to spring 
from them. ii;s'\ll the rocks, indeed, of which we 
have any knowledge, whether crystalline or stratified, 
have been formed since the creation of the elements 
of which they consist, we may justly assume that'the 
surface of the earth to the depth which they now 
occupy, whatever that may he, was in its primitive 
state, in the form of dust, or without cementation in 
hard masses. If such was its state, the water of the 



DEKIVED FEOM THE ENTEKIOK OF THE EAETH. 337 

ocean would naturally have descended into it, and as 
long as it met with no other substances than those 
that constitute granite, as it would have excited little 
more chemical action than sea water now does on 
pulverized granite, its chief effect would have been 
simply to moisten and soften the mass, and render it 
susceptible of a more easy displacement when sub- 
jected to the impulse of a powerful force from be- 
neath. On the supposition, then, that the water 
descended to a depth equal to that of the present vol- 
canic fires, which is, probably, at least fifteen or 
twenty miles below the surface, ere it came in con- 
tact with elements like iron, for example, and sulphur, 
which it could excite to powerful chemical action, 
and that it was then decomposed, a violent heat de- 
veloped, and vast volumes of expansive gases gene- 
rated ; the effect would have been an upheaval of the 
softened mass at the points where that action became 
energetic, and at length the opening of a passage to 
the surface, by chasms extending, perhaps, long dis- 
tances, through which the imprisoned forces beneath 
would have found vents ; and the main discharges 
from which, at first, would obviously not have been 
molten lava, nor mud raised to a great heat, but the 
softened earth itself nearest the surface, and subse- 
quently from greater depths. All the force of a pow- 
erful volcano may thus be supposed to have been 
employed for a long time in the seasons of its activity, 

15 



338 THE MATEEIAJLS OF THE STRATA, 

in the propulsion to the surface of such unfused mate- 
rials as form the great elements of the strata, ere burn- 
ing lava began to be ejected; and this supposition is 
coiToborated by the fact, that it was not till the pri- 
mary and secondary strata had been formed that the 
igneous rocks began to appear on the surface. 

Another important effect of such a process would 
have been, that that portion of the earth's surface 
which was expanded upwards beneath the ocean, 
would have been exposed by its elevation to the vio- 
lent action of waves and tides, and currents, and 
swept off and spread, like that ejected from the 
depths below, over the surrounding surface. On the 
intermission of such an eruption, the chasm would 
speedily have been obliterated by the action of the 
waters on the softened mass, and soon, perhaps, no 
other indications of it remained, than the greater 
thickness near it of the stratum it had formed, thati 
at a distance ; as strata usually thin out regularly 
from the point or line where they attain their greatest 
depth. 

Yiews very similar to these were several years 
since suggested by Mr. Bakewell, an eminent Eng- 
lish geologist, for the purpose especially of accounting 
for the limestone and chalk forii^ations. Thus, he 
says : 

" In refeiTing to the vast magnitude of ancient Tolcanoes, 



DEKIVED FKOM THE INTEEIOK OF THE EAETH. 339 

I have stated that thej had, doubtless, an important office 
to perform in nature ; and can it be unreasonable to believe 
that the, earth itself is the great storehouse where the materials 
that form its surface were prepared, and from whence they 
were thrown out upon the surface in an igneous, aqueous, or 
gaseous state, either as melted lava, or in aqueous solution, or 
in mechanical admixture with water in the form of mud, or in 
the comminuted state of powder or sand ? Inflammable and 
more volatile substances may have been emitted in a gaseous 
state, and become concrete on the surface. 

" These primaeval eruptions, judging from the size of the 
ancient fissures and craters, may have been sufficient to cover 
a large portion of the glole. Nor can it be deemed impro- 
bable that still larger and more ancient craters have been 
entirely covered by succeeding eruptions. In proportion as 
the formation of the surface advanced, these eruptions might 
decline and be more and more limiteol in their operation. 

" It is not necessary to suppose that these subterranean 
eruptions consisted only of lava in a state of fusion. The 
largest active volcanoes at present existing, throw out the 
different earths intermixed with water in the form of mud. 
Nor should we limit the eruptions of earthy matter in solu- 
tion or suspension to volcanic craters ; the vast fissures or 
rents which intersect the different rocks, may have served 
for the passage of silicious solutions to the surface. We 
know of no instance in nature of silicious earth being held 
in aqueous solution, except in the waters of hot or boiling 
springs ; and hence it seems reasonable to infer that many 
silicious rocks and veins have been deposited from subterra- 



3^0 THE MATEKIALS OF THE STEATA, 

nean craters at a higli temperature. Calcareous or creta- 
ceous matter is also ejected during aqueous volcanic erup- 
tions. According to Ferrara, streams of liquid chalk, or 
chalk in the state of mud, were ejected from the mud vol- 
cano of Macaluba, in Sicily, in 11 "J 1, which in a short space 
formed a bed several feet in thickness. Beds of limestone 
may have been formed by similar calcareous eruptions, in 
which the lime might be sometimes in solution, and some- 
times mechanically suspended ; and the numerous remains of 
testaceous animals in limestone appear to indicate that the 
calcareous solutions were favorable to the growth of ani- 
mals whose coverings contain so much calcareous matter. 
Nor is it necessary to suppose that these aqueous eruptions 
were always sudden, and attended with violent convulsions, 
for when a passage was once opened they may have risen 
slowly, and have been diffused in a tranquil state, and by 
gradual deposition or condensation, may have enveloped the 
most delicate animals or vegetables without injuring their 
external form. 

" If the geologist can admit such a condition of the an- 
cient world as above described — a condition which on a 
smaller scale might be proved to have existed since the 
period of authentic history ; if he will further admit, that 
before the formation of chalk, a great portion of what is now 
England and the northern continent of Europe, was covered 
by a deep ocean, interspersed with islands and surrounded 
by ancient continents — and this few modern geologists will 
deny — then if we allow submarine aqueous eruptions of cal- 
careous matter either in solution or mechanical suspension, 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTEKIOR OF THE EASTH. 341 

and eruptions of silicious solutions from thermal waters, to 
haT3 been poured over the bottom of this deep and ancient 
ocean, we shall have all the circumstances required to form 
thick beds of chalk, interspersed with layers and nodules of 
flint. ... 

" My object in directing the attention of geologists to 
this subject, is to show that strata may he formed more 
rapidly than they are generally disposed to believe ; and 
that the feeble operations of natural causes in our own 
times, however similar in kind, bear no proportion in thek 
intensity to the mighty agents that have formed the ancient 
crust of the globe." — BakeweWs Geology, pp. 351-355. 

A similar suggestion in respect to the origin of 
limestone was made by Mr. Featherstonliaugli, in his 
Keport in 1835. 

•'' The general deposits of calcareous matter on the globe 
have been by some persons attributed to the exuviae of 
animals, without stopping to inquire whence those animals 
derived the solid parts they have left behind them. As we 
know not that animals have the power of forming lime from 
other mineral elements, we are compelled to suppose that the 
calcareous matter forming their osseous structure, their 
testaceous and crustaceous coverings, preceded them. In 
considering the primitive rocks, we have perceived that 
forces of great power, and unknown in modern times, have 
been in action in the earlier periods of the planet — forces 
which even now continue occasionally to act, though feebly 



342 THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA, 

and rarely. As to the manner in which the statuary lime- 
stones were produced, there is much ambiguity. We know, 
however, that mineral springs, both thermal and cold, deposit 
carbonate of lime in great quantities, as they come in con- 
tact with the atmosphere. The prodigious deposits of this 
character form a cold mineral water in the Sweet Springs 
valley in Virginia, which presents one of the most rare geolo- 
gical phenomena; the no less interesting travertine deposited 
by the Hot Springs of the Washita in Arkansas, both of which 
localities I visited this last year; and similar phenomena in 
various parts of the world, render it quite possible that 
some extraneous calcareous deposits, lying amidst the pri- 
mitive rocks, have come from the central parts of the earth in a 
state of aqueous solution, and have subsequently received 
their high crystalline character from being in contact with 
ignigenous rocks in an incandescent state. With springs 
of such a character in action, the animals of those times 
could be at no loss for calcareous matter in favored locali- 
ties. 

" In the grauwacke we have beds of limestone, derived, 
for aught we know to the contrary, like the statuary lime- 
stone in the primitive series, from solutions ejected from 
below, alternating with schistose and sandy beds of probable 
mechanical origin.'' — Feather stonhaugNs Report, 1835, on the 
country between the Missouri and Red Rivers, pp. 20-25. 

Sucli as we liave already sbowu, is the theory in 
respect to the origin of limestone advanced by T)-,-. 
Emmons. We cite from liini anoilier passage. 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 343 

*'Tbe opinions of geologists in relation to the origin of 
limestone have been hitherto unsettled. From the great 
amount of limestone in the strata which may be inspected, 
it has been supposed that animals possessed the power of 
forming it, or of combining its elements. This view or 
theory seems to be wholly unnecessary ; for what reason 
have we to infer that it is a material less common in the 
interior of the earth than silex or alumine ? And if it is 
common, it may find its way to the surface by the same 
means as the materials composing other rocks. 

'* Leaving here the opinions of other geologists, I will 
state that there are two points which it will be my object 
to establish : 1st, That it is a rock of igneous origin ; and 
2d, That it is unstratified, which follows from the establish- 
ment of the first point : or, if the last proposition is placed 
first — viz. that the rock is unstratified, its igneous origin 
fieems to follow with equal certainty ; so that the points to 
be proved are really reduced to one." — Emmons's Geology 
of the Second District of New York, p. 38. 

He proceeds, accordingly, to establish these points 

by proofs drawn from the rock in a great number of 

localities- 
Mr. Hall adopts the same theory to account for the 

forniation of some of the sandstones of the western 

district of this State. 

" If we might be permitted to hazard a conjecture as to 
the changes and their causes going on at the time of the 
deposition of these different divisions of the Medina sand- 



34:4c THE MATEEIALS OF THE STEATA, 

stone — we sheuld incline to the belief that the lower shaly 
deposit was the product of a mud volcano, rapidly ejected 
and spread over the surface, rendering the sea turbid and 
discolored to such a degree as to prevent the existence 
of any organic forms. Afterwards the cessation of the 
volcanic action allowed the deposition of the grey quart- 
zose mass j the materials having perhaps the same origin 
as the grey sandstone which was formed previous to the 
commencement of the Medina. Although at this period 
there was no matter ejected from the volcano, still it may 
have produced oscillations of the surface, causing alternate 
deep and shallow water, or deep water in some places and 
shallow in others. Subsequently, towards the close of the 
grey deposit, the volcano broke forth again with renewed 
energy, destroying all the organic forms which had come 
into existence during this comparatively quiescent period, 
and overwhelming the whole with another deposit of mud 
like that below. Again, after a time the subterranean 
action appears to have become more quiet, gradually sub- 
siding, and allowing an increase of sandy matter from some 
other source. Lastly, towards the termination of the 
deposit of mud, and when the sand had increased considera- 
bly, we find an abundance of vegetable forms, . . . and the 
whole series terminating with the grey division, marked by 
that singular fossil, the Dictuolites." — /. HaWs Geology of 
Western New York, p. 40. 

We have the most decisive evidences, therefore, 
tliat the great agents that have acted in the depths 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTEKIOR OF THE EARTH. 345 

of tlie earth wliero tlie substances of which the strata 
consist were originally deposited, were abundantly 
adequate to transfer them to the surface in the state 
that was requisite to their conversion into the rocks 
into which they were formed. 

QUESTIONS. 

What is the tliird fact which shows that the strata may have been 
derived from the interior of the earth ? What proofs are there of it ? 
Was the force by which the mountains were upheaved far greater 
than was requisite to eject a current of lava or other liquid matter 
from the deep recesses of the earth ? Is the force, however, exerted 
in volcanic eruptions sometimes very great ? Give an example of it 
in Iceland. Give an example in Hawaii. Were the materials of the 
strata however lavas? What was their state, prohably, when ejected 
into the ocean ? Have the crystalline, as well as other rocks, been 
formed since the creation? What was the form, probably, of the 
earthy matter which originally constituted the exterior of the globe ? 
Would the water of the ocean, resting on such a bottom, naturally 
descend in it to a great depth ? If in descending ten, fifteen, or 
twenty miles — the supposed depth of the present volcanic fires — it 
came in contact with extensive depositories of iron and sulphur, 
would it not have excited them to a chemical action that would have 
decomposed it, developed intense heat, generated vast volumes of 
gas, and thereby caused an upheaval of the soft and pliant mass'of 
earthy matter above ; and at length, by forcing passages to the sur- 
face, driven it in torrents and rivers into the ocean ? Would that 
part of the surface that was upheaved be acted on also by the waves 
and currents, and its matter swept off and spread over the bottom of 
the surrounding sea? Have views like these of the sources from 
which the matter of the strata was drawn, sometimes been presented 
by geologists ? What is the intimation which Mr. Bakewell presents 

15^ 



84:6 THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA, 

in respect to it ? What are Mr. Featherstonhaugh's suggestions 
respecting the source from which the treasures of lime were drawn 
that form the immense beds of that mineral ? What other writers 
have presented similar views ? Are there ample proofs, then, that 
the great agents that have acted in the interior of the earth have 
been of adequate strength to force the substances to the surface of 
which the strata are constructed ? 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 84:7 



CHAPTEE XY. 

The Materials of the Strata— Derived from the Interior of the Earth. 

These agents were adequate to the transferrence of 
the materials of the strata from the interior to the sur- 
face, in the period that is represented in the Mosaic 
record as having intervened betwixt the creation of 
the earth and the remodification of its surface at the 
flood. Sixteen hundred, eighteen hundred, or two 
thousand years were as ample for the work, as sixteen 
or eighteen thousand, or the immeasurable round of 
ages which geologists represent as having been occu- 
pied in the derivation of the materials of the strata 
from granitic mountains and continents that were to 
be disintegrated and transported to the ocean by the 
feeble agents that are now reducing the rocks to dust, 
and conveying their detritus to the sea. That the 
materials for such a process were deposited in the 
depths of the earth throughout its whole circuit, is 
seen from the fact, that the whole mass of the granite 
which is now elevated into the atmosphere, and which 
lies beneath the stratified formations, has, in the judg- 
ment generally of geologists, been raised to fusion by 



34:8 THE MATEBIALS OF THE STRATA, 

heat from beneatli, and received its present crystal- 
line form since tlie deposition of the primary strata. 
There is no reason to suppose that a particle of 
that rock was brought into existence in its present 
state by the creative fiat. It is the work of powerful 
chemical and mechanical forces that have since acted 
on the silex, alumine, potash, soda, lime, iron, mag- 
nesia, and other ingredients of which it is constructed. 
But if that took place in the manner we have sup- 
posed, by the evolution of heat in the depths of the 
earth, the first efi'ect of which was the propulsion to 
the surface of vast masses of silex, alumine, lime, pot- 
ash, soda, magnesia, iron, and other elements that 
enter into the composition of the strata, in the form 
of minute particles, moistened or rendered liquid by 
water, then, manifestly, the causes of the propulsion 
of these materials to the exterior existed beneath 
every point of the surface, and were as universal as 
the strata themselves are that have been formed from 
them. They were undoubtedly, therefore, at least as 
adequate to the production of the latter effect as they 
were of the former. Indeed, if the views we have 
presented of the process are correct, the fusion of the 
granitic elements, which originally lay at the surface, 
could not have been produced by the evolution of 
heat in the abysses beneath, without first producing 
chasms and vents at innumerable points, and forcing 
up into the superincumbent oceans immense volumes 



DEEIVED FKOM THE INTEKIOE OF THE EAUTH. 349 

of tlie moistened materials tliat lay between the sur- 
face and the great subterranean laboratory from 
which the heat and the explosive forces generated by 
it proceeded. 

Let us suppose the waters of Lake Superior to be 
drained, and its bed scooped down through the whole 
series of stratified and crystallized rocks that lie be- 
neath it, till a region were reached at a depth per- 
haps of fifteen or twenty miles, where, let it be 
assumed, a vast magazine is treasured up of volcanic 
materials. Let us then suppose the chasm to be filled 
by successive layers, each hundreds or thousands of 
feet in thickness, of silex, alumine, lime, potash, soda, 
iron, magnesia, and a proportionate share of the other 
elements that entered into the composition of the 
strata, in minute primitive particles. Let us suppose 
the waters of the lake then to be readmitted to its 
bed, and gradually to descend through it till they 
reached the magazine of volcanic matter, and gene- 
rated an expansive force by which the superincum- 
bent mass should be pushed upwards ; it is manifest 
that that portion of the upper layer, at the points 
where the impulse from below was the greatest, 
would be the first that would be raised above the 
general level and mixed with the waters of the lake ; 
and that if it were silex, it would, on being subjected 
to the proper agencies, form quartz rock or sandstone ; 
if alumine, with an intermixture of silex, it would 
form marl, or some species of schist ; and if lime, lime- 



350 THE MATERIALS OP THE STRATA, 

stone. The eifect of the impelling force from beneath, 
however, especially if large volumes of gas were 
driven upwards, would soon be to open a passage to 
the surface by a vein or chasm, through which a cur- 
rent of the moistened or lic^aid matter would be driven 
up into the waters of the lake, and diffused over its 
bottom ; and if that process were continued, a portion 
of each layer in the series would be raised to the sur- 
face and spread in a stratum over the bed of the lake 
■ — ^before a stream of melted lava would mount 
through the passage and pass into the waters, or shoot 
into the atmosphere. But such a stupendous enginery 
acting, with slight intervals, at innumerable points 
throughout the circuit of the globe, would have been 
amply adequate to throw the whole materials of the 
strata on the surface in the lapse of fifteen, sixteen, or 
eighteen hundred years. Such a period ^vould, in- 
deed, seem excessive rather than too short for such a 
work. Such powerful agents, acting at points not 
more numerous than those at which igneous rocks and 
lavas have been driven to the surface, would undoubt- 
edly have been sufficient for that effect. 

"We have thus the most ample evidence of the 
existence at that period of the requisite materials and 
agents in the proper conditions for the accomplishment 
of that w^ork. We shall now proceed to show that 
this view of the origin of the strata is corroborated 
and verified by a variety of considerations. 

It is confirmed by the great number of the points 



DEEIVED FROM THE INTEEIOR OF THE EAETH. 351 

at wliicli igneous rocks and lavas have been forced up 
to tlie surface. The number of volcanoes tliat burned 
during the formation of the secondary and tertiary 
strata was not only far greater than at present, but in 
the ratio probably of hundreds to one. Their traces 
are seen on a vast scale in many regions where no 
eruptions have taken place for centuries. Thus they 
are very numerous in Central and Southern France, 
sixty cones being distinguishable in the single pro- 
vince of Auvergne. They exist in great numbers in 
Germany, Hungary, Transylvania, and Styria. In 
ITorthern, Central, and Southern Italy they are very 
frequent ; in Sicily, also, Sardinia, and the neighbor- 
ing islands. Traces of them are seen in Spain and 
Portugal. Their relics exist on a great scale in the 
islands of the Grecian Archipelago, and throughout 
Asia Minor. They are seen also in Syria, Southern 
Arabia, Persia, I^orthern and Eastern Asia, and the 
islands of the Chinese seas. Most of the islands of 
the Atlantic, and — except those of coral — nearly the 
whole of the vast crowd that stud the Indian and Pa- 
cific oceans, have been the seat of volcanoes ; and 
craters that no longer burn are found in gi-eat num- 
bers along the whole line of the mountains that skirt 
the Pacific coast, from the Arctic ocean to Cape Horn. 
If the number still active in difi'erent parts of the 
globe is, as is supposed, from one hundred and sev- 
enty-five to two hundred, the whole series that have 



352 THE MATEEIALS OF THE STRATA, 

burned at successive periods must undoubtedly 
amount to many tliousands. 

But the number of points at which igneous rocks — • 
granite, porphyry, basalt, and trap — have been forced 
up to the surface, is immensely greater. Some, or all 
of them, are found in almost every considerable dis- 
trict of the globe. Though there are no traces in the 
British islands of modern volcanoes, granite, porphyry, 
greenstone, hypersthene, basalt, and trap form the 
crust, or lie immediately beneath the soil in England, 
Scotland, Ireland and the Hebrides and Orkneys, in 
thousands of places, indicating that there has b^en at 
least an equal number of passages from the molten 
abyss beneath, through which first the materials that 
lay above it, and then a portion of its own contents, 
have been driven up to the surface. In this country 
no lavas occur throughout the wide space betwixt the 
Mississippi and ISTew Brunswick, or the great lakes 
and the Atlantic ; yet granite, porphyry, hypersthene, 
hornblende, greenstone, serpentine, basalt, and trap, 
rise to the surface, or tower into the atmosphere in 
myriads and perhaps hundreds of thousands of places, 
so distinct from each other as to show that the pas- 
sages through which they generally made their way 
to the surface were separate from each other. They 
are equally numerous also on other portions of the 
globe. Half as many channels of ejection from below, 
and probably a much smaller number, would have 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 353 

been adequate for tlie transfer to tlie surface, in a very- 
few centuries, of a sufficient mass of materials for the 
formation of the strata. That such a vast number of 
openings have been formed from the interior, through 
which immense volumes of matter have been thrown 
up and incorporated in the crust of the globe, demon- 
strates, at least, the possibility and probability that 
it was through them or others of a like nature that 
the silex, alumine, lime, soda, iron, potash, and other 
elements of which the strata are built, were forced up 
into the oceans and seas from which they were depo- 
sited. 

It is corroborated by the deposition of the great 
elements — silex, alumine, and lime — of which the 
strata consist, in separate layers, instead of a promis- 
cuous mixture ; — silex constituting sandstone chiefly ; 
lime forming limestone and chalk; and alumine, 
potash, and soda, which are "conspicuous ingredients 
of felspar, entering, in a large measure, into the 
composition of shales, clays, and marls. That the 
ingredients of the strata are treasured up in masses 
separately from each other in the depths of the earth, 
is demonstrated, as we have already shown, by their 
being often separately ejected and embodied in the 
igneous rocks. Their distribution into separate strata 
is explicable, therefore, on the supposition that they 
were drawn from such depositories, and not on any 
other theory of their origin. Had they been formed, 



354: THE MATEEIALS OF THE STEATA, 

as geologists generally maintain, from the detritus of 
granitic mountains and continents that was trans- 
ported by rivers to the sea, instead of being separated 
from each other and arranged in distinct layers, they 
would have been deposited in a confused mass toge- 
ther. But if ejected successively from different 
depositories in the recesses of the earth, they would 
naturally continue separate^ in a great degree, on 
their transfusion into the waters of the sea, and be 
deposited in beds by themselves. They would 
receive that disposition, whether they were drawn 
from repositories placed in a series beneath each 
other, like that in w^hich they are arranged in the 
strata, and thence had egress in succession at the 
same channel, or whether each one, descending in a 
column into the depths of the earth, was thrown up 
through a passage that was limited to itself Either 
of these hypotheses furnishes a solution also of the 
partial intermixture of the strata sometimes seen at 
their juncture, or the passage of one into another, of 
which the common theory presents no explanation. 
The ejection of their elements through the same or 
different passages, in immediate succession, would 
naturally cause a mixture of those of their particles 
that ^YQve held in suspension in the waters of the 
ocean at the same time, or in close succession to each 
other. That this view of their origin thus naturally 
accounts for these conspicuous characteristics of the 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTEEIOK OF THE EAETH. 355 

strata, that are inexplicable on any other theory, is a 
strong proof of its truth. 

It is confirmed by tlie solution it furnishes of tlie 
diffusion of the strata over wide spaces. On the 
theory held by geologists, the spread of a stratum of 
gneiss, quartz, sandstone, arenaceous limestone, or any 
other similar deposit over a large area, is wholly inex- 
plicable. It is inconsistent with the forces that gov- 
ern the transportation and deposition of pebbles, 
gravel, and sand in water, that, being borne down to 
the sea by streams and rivers, they should be trans- 
fused through its mass and deposited equally over 
hundreds, and even thousands of square miles. As 
the currents by which they are supposed to be borne 
forward are checked by the resistance they meet on 
entering the ocean, gravel and sand of every descrip- 
tion are immediately carried , by their weight to the 
bottom, and are no more subject afterwards to be 
transferred to other places than any other parts of the 
shore or bed of the sea. That the waves, currents, 
and tides should remove them and spread them into 
strata over regions scores and hundreds of miles in 
length and breadth, is physically impossible. If, 
however, the materials of the strata were thrown up 
from the depths of the earth into the waters of the 
ocean in the form of the primitive minute particles 
in which Newton and other philosophers regard 
matter as originally created, their diffusion over wide 



356 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

spaces would naturally result from their lightness and 
mobility under the action of the tides, currents, and 
waves of the sea. Driven up into the mass of the 
waters by the impulse that forced them from below, 
they would be borne off by the current the stream in 
which they entered created, and continue for a period 
to float, like the impalpable particles that are held in 
solution or suspension by the Mississippi, Ganges, 
and other great rivers ; and when thrown to the 
bottom, would form at first a liquid mud that would, 
by its own gravity, spread on every side and seek a 
level, as water at the surface, though partially thick- 
ened with light mud, flows in every direction till it 
finds a level. Silex or lime forced up in that form 
through numerous channels, widely distributed, into 
the ocean tl:)^t spread from Vermont to the Kocky 
Mountains, would naturally have been diffused, by 
the forces to which it would have been subjected, 
over as large an area as is occupied by any of the 
sandstones or limestones of that region; and the layers 
in which it would at length have been deposited, 
would naturally have thinned out also from the cen- 
tres from which they were spread, so as to vary at 
different points in thickness, as the sandstones, lime- 
stones, and shales of that region vary. 

The union of their particles in granules and grains 
took place probably at their deposition. The causes 
that determined them to assume those forms are not 



DEEIYED FROM THE INTEEIOE OF THE EAETH. 357 

known. That tliey were peculiar, however, to that 
era, is seen from the fact that grains of silex and fel- 
spar are no longer formed where those substances are 
deposited from water. The supposition that they 
assumed the shapes in which they now exist in the 
strata, at the time of their deposition, or cementation 
into solid rock, is as compatible, for aught that is 
known, with the laws of their formation, as the sup- 
position that their concretion into grains took place 
at an earlier period. 

These views are confirmed by the explanations 
they furnish of the elevations and subsidences of por- 
tions of the crust of the globe, which appear to have 
taken place during the formation of the strata, and 
that occasionally occur still. 

Had the earth been, as is very generally main- 
tained by geologists, in a state of "fusion from 
intense heat " when it began to be overspread with 
its solid crust ; and if, as they hold, its interior (with 
the exception of a stratum of a few miles' thickness 
on its surface) has continued in that condition, no 
such elevation or depression of parts of its rocky 
covering could have taken place ; nor could there 
have been an ejection of any of its liquid elements to 
the surface by volcanic forces. In order to an eleva- 
tion of any portion of its solid crust, or propulsion of 
a part of its interior matter to the surface, a fresh 
evolution of heat and generation of gases, creatiug a 



358 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

pressure outward, would be necessary. But such a 
molten condition of tlie interior would preclude the 
possibility of either of those processes. A fresh evo- 
lution of heat and generation of expansive gases 
could only take place by a fresh and powerful action 
on each other of chemical substances and agents, by 
which portions of their elements would assume new 
forms, enter into new combinations, and release, in 
the process, vast volumes of heat that had before 
remained latent. But in such an ocean of molten 
lava no substances or agents of that nature would 
exist. Every particle of its matter being — by the 
supposition — already in intense fusion, it would have 
reached the maximum of the chemical agency in that 
form of which it was capable, and given out all the 
latent heat and discharged all the gases which it 
could yield. The chemical action accordingly of 
its several parts on each other having terminated, 
they would have sunk into repose and been incapable 
of any further change by virtue of their own powers, 
than a gradual loss of their caloric by conduction 
through their rocky envelope to the ocean and atmos- 
phere without. All elevation of any part of the crust 
of the globe, or a propulsion of lava to the surface by 
the agency of such a molten ocean, would conse- 
quently be impossible. How could forces of such 
vast energy as would be requisite to lift a portion of 
the earth's crust, thirty, forty, or fifty miles in thick- 



DERIVED FROM THE INTEEIOK OF THE EAJRTH. 359 

ness, and extending tliroiigli several degrees in length 
and breadth, be generated by a chemical agency, 
when there were no chemical substances or agents 
within the globe capable of acting on each other in 
such a manner as to develop an additional measure 
of heat, and expand the matter of which they con- 
sisted into larger dimensions? How could ]3assages 
be forced outward to the surface, and immense 
volumes of gas and melted matter be driven with 
resistless violence to the surface, when the mass 
within w^as necessarily in a state of absolute repose, 
and no elements existed in it that were capable of 
yielding a fresh expansive force ? A volcano eject- 
ing a fiery flood from such a world would be as 
impossible as it w^ould from a vacuum. 

That theory, therefore, not only furnishes no solu- 
tion of the elevations and depressions to which the 
crust of the earth has been subjected ; but it exhibits 
those and all other processes of the kind as impossi- 
ble. 'No volcanoes could have existed, no earthquakes 
could have taken place, no elevation of mountains, 
no dislocation of the strata could have been wrought 
by the action of forces from within had its constitu- 
tion and conditions been what that hypothesis repre- 
sents. That none of the great number of practical 
and speculative geologists and chemists who have 
advocated that view have caught a glimpse of conse- 
quences that would result with such certainty from 



860 THE MATEEIAI.S OF THE STRATA, 

the condition of the earth which they suppose, and 
the laws of chemical action, is truly surprising. They 
appear to have adopted the theory without looking at 
the implications which it involves. 

On the view, however, of the earth's structure 
which we have advanced, all the phenomena of earth- 
quakes and volcanoes, and the upheaval, depression, 
and dislocation of the surface, are naturally explaina- 
ble. If vast masses of chemical substances were 
placed in separate repositories in the depths of the 
earth, that were susceptible, on being acted on by 
water, electricity, or other agents, of giving out im- 
mense measures of heat, generating vast volumes of 
gas, and exciting a combustion, by which the matter 
with which they were in contact would be raised to 
intense fusion, the expansion their action on a large 
scale would create, would, of necessity, either upheave 
the crust of the globe that rested on them, or force a 
passage through the crust, and relieve itself by an 
expulsion of the imprisoned matter till an equilibrium 
were restored. If the materials by which that heat 
and combustion were excited, were at length ex- 
hausted, and the temperature subsided to its original 
point, a space would then be left vacant in the inte- 
rior commensurate with that which was originally 
occupied by the volume of matter that had been 
ejected to the surface ; and if that space, instead of a 
great dej)th, were spread like a stratum over a wide 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EAUTH. 361 

level, tlie weight of the inciimbent mass might, from 
the distance of the points on which it rested, force it 
to descend and fill np the vacmim. An elevation, 
a depression, and a dislocation of the surface, would 
thus naturally result from such an action of those 
causes ; and there is no other view on which an up- 
heaval or depression of a part of the earth's crust can 
be accounted for. As an upheaval and expulsion of 
matter to the surface could only result from a fresh 
evolution of heat producing an expansion of the sub- 
stances on which it acted ; so a subsidence could only 
result from a diminution or discontinuance of that 
expansion, by a diminution or cessation of the evolu- 
tion of heat, in consequence of which, the upward 
pressure ceasing, a vacancy would be created, and the 
superincumbent crust, deprived in a measure of its 
supjDort, would sink under the force of gravity till it 
met a firm basis. How could an area of the surface 
sink down a distance towards the centre, unless the 
space into which it descended had become vacant? 
If the support that had always upheld it remained 
unaltered, to what cause would it owe its depression ? 
But how could a cavity of dimensions adequate for 
such a movement be produced in the depths of the 
earth, except by a transferrence of the materials, that 
originally occupied it, to the surface ? And how 
could they be transferred to the exterior, except by 
an expansion of the matter that lay beneath or behind 

16 



362 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

them, and occupation of the space from which they 
were expelled ? How, on the other hand, could that 
expansion cease, and the matter that had last filled 
the recess it had created, subside into its original 
dimensions, except by a discontinuance of the chemi- 
cal action of which that expansion was the effect ? 
And what could occasion such a discontinuance, 
except the exhaustion of the chemical substances in 
which tliat action and the evolution of heat it had 
caused, had their origin ? There are no other known 
causes and processes from which those results could 
spring? As then, wherever a subsidence has taken 
place, the vacancy into which the depressed crust 
descended must have been created by the expulsion to 
the surface of the substances that had originally occu- 
pied it, wherever those ejected substances were not, 
in some measure at least, in the form of lava, they 
must — so far as they were not purely gaseous — have 
been unfused, and consisted, therefore, either of dry 
or moistened particles, or been held in suspension or 
solution in water. But there are many localities in 
which elevations and subsidences appear to have 
taken place where no traces are seen of lava, or any 
species of igneous rock. The substances, therefore, 
which at those localities have been thrown up to the 
surface from the space into which the subsiding crust 
descended, must have heen unfused^ and entered^ in 
the manner we have supjposed^ into the convposition of 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOE OF THE EARTH. 363 

the strata. In what otlier form can tliey liave been 
ejected? or what other disposition can have been 
made of them ? No nnfiised silex, alumine, lime., 
magnesia, soda, or potash, are found on the surface, 
except that which is incorporated in the sedimentary 
strata and the loose soils that rest on them. 

Tliis view of the causes of the elevation and depres 
sion of the earth's crust admits of their occurrence as 
often during the formation of the strata as appear- 
ances indicate that they have taken place, and sug- 
gests the reason that subsidences have been followed 
by upheavals, as well as upheavals by subsidences. 
If the chemical and combustible elements in which a 
volcano has its origin, are distributed in layers so vary- 
ing in breadth and thickness that the quantity expo- 
sed to the action of the fire is at sometimes far greater 
than at otliers, or the layers or masses in wliich they 
are arranged are separated by barriers that for a time 
intercept the progress of combustion, variations will 
naturally occur, like those which actually take place 
in its activity, and transitions at times from violent 
ebullition to repose and apparent extinction, and from 
repose to sudden and violent eruption. It would give 
rise also to such alternate elevations and depressions 
as portions of the earth's crust appear to have under- 
gone. An exhaustion of the materials to whicli the 
fire had access, would be followed by a season of inac- 
tion, a discontinuance of the upward pressure, and 



364: THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA, 

thence a descent of the mass above, from the loss of 
its support, into the vacant recess ; but the fires reach- 
ing a new depository of combustibles, perhaps by a 
slight train, perhaps by the shock of an earthquake 
breaking down barriers, or opening fresh chasms, it 
would burst out afresh, rage with its primitive vio- 
lence, and produce a new upheaval of the crust that 
lay between it and the atmosphere. But how could 
such alternations of activity and repose take place if 
the whole interior of the globe were maintained uni- 
formly at the same point of intense fusion ? How 
could a second upheaval occur, if, instead of an occa- 
sional augmentation, a perpetual diminution of heat 
took place — as must, were the common theory true — 
by conduction to the ocean or air through the sur- 
rounding strata ? 

That these and other kindred processes to which 
the earth has been subjected, which are wholly inex- 
plicable on the theory generally held by geolo- 
gists, thus admit of a satisfactory explanation on the 
view we have advanced of the earth's structure and 
the derivation of the strata, is a decisive proof that 
that view is correct. 

This view of the origin of the materials of the strata, 
and the consequent subsidence of the crust of the 
earth into the vacuum their removal had created, 
suggests an explanation of the accumulation of the 
vast mass of tree-ferns and other vegetables in the 



DEEIVED FKOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 365 

localities where they have been converted into coal. 
That the materials from which the coal was formed 
did not in the main grow where the coal lies, is appa- 
rent from the immense bulk that was required for 
beds that are of any considerable thickness ; and from 
the fact that that of which the bottom of the strata 
was formed, exhibits no more marks of having under- 
gone decomposition or decay than that which lay at 
the top. The traces of stems, branches, and leaves, 
are as distinct and perfect in the lower divisions of 
the strata, as at the centre or surface. The whole, 
therefore, of which a layer w^as constituted, must 
have been deposited at once. How, then, were they 
conveyed thither ? How, for example, was the im- 
measurable mass of which the principal stratum was 
formed extending from the Delaware to the Missis- 
sippi, and from the Appalachians nearly to the lakes, 
and of a depth in many places of ten, twelve, or four- 
teen feet, conveyed to that area ? Not by rivers. All 
the vegetable matter that was ever borne on the 
streams of the continent, multiplied thousands and mil- 
lions of times, would be inadequate to constitute such 
an immense bed. All the trees and plants that grow 
in the line of the rivers of a continent, in such posi- 
tions as to expose them to be uprooted and borne off 
by floods, is but an inappreciable fraction compared 
to the whole that springs from the vales, plains, and 
mountains ; and would never in the lapse of ages 



366 



amount to enougli, could they be concentrated at one 
point, to form a coal bed of any considerable tliick- 
ness and extent. But tliat those of which the strata 
were formed were not transported to the places of 
their deposition by the agency of rivers, is apparent 
from the absence from the coal of all earthy sedi- 
ment. Had rivers at periods of flood been the agents 
of their transportation, they would have been inter- 
mixed, like the trees that are carried by the Missis- 
sippi to its mouth, with a mass of mud, that would 
have precluded their conversion into a stratum of 
pure coal. • The only force that could have swept 
them together in such an immeasurable mass unmixed 
with other matter, was that of the ocean rushing over 
a vast tract of fern-forests, and other vegetables, that 
was rapidly sinking beneath it. And that might 
have accomplished it. Let us suppose, for example, 
that immediately antecedent to the deposition of the 
principal stratum of the great bed of Pennsylvania, 
Yirginia, Ohio, and Indiana, the continent eastward 
to the Atlantic, and westward to the Eocky Moun- 
tains, stood above the ocean and was covered with a 
rich vegetable growth. As none of the mountains 
that now stretch across it had then risen above the 
surface, had it suddenly sunk a half mile or mile 
beneath the line of the sea, the waters rushing over it 
with resistless force, would have uprooted or wrench- 
ed off all trees and vegetables of any considerable 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OP THE EARTH. 367 

size ; and bearing them forward in a confused mass, 
accumulated them chiefly on a line where the waters 
of the two oceans met. If the subsidence began so 
much earlier on the Pacific than the Atlantic side, 
that their waves met or finally sank to repose on the 
line of that coal bed, the relics with which they were 
charged would have centered there. As they would 
naturally have been much entangled, that part which 
lay lowest v/ould, on being saturated with water by 
the pressure to which it was subjected, have become 
so heavy as to have sunk, and dragged down such as 
was bound with it ; the next tier would soon have 
followed, and the whole at length have reached the 
bottom, where its own weight, increased by the water 
with which its cells would have become filled, and 
the vast pressure of the ocean, would speedily have 
reduced it to a solid mass. Such processes are cer- 
tainly adequate to the production of such effects, and 
they are processes which all geologists admit have 
indisputably taken place. Why, then, should not the 
solution w^hich they furnish of the accumulation of 
the materials of the coal strata, which is inexplicable 
on the prevailing theor}^, be accepted as legitimate ? 
The causes to which we thus refer the transporta- 
tion of the materials of the principal strata — silex, 
alumine, lime, and vegetables — to their places of 
deposit, are certainly of sufiicient energy to have 
accomplished their formation with great celerity. 



368 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

And a variety of proofs indicate that they were, in 
fact, formed in a very rapid manner. 

Thus, that the vegetables which were converted into 
coal, were deposited and buried by the strata that lie 
above them within a short space, is seen from the 
fact, already stated, that the outlines of the stocks, 
branches, and most delicate leaves, are preserved in 
every part of the bituminized mass unobliterated ; 
which could not have occurred had they been ex- 
posed for long periods to the wear of the restless 
waters, and the action of decomposing forces. 

That the strata, also, above them were deposited 
almost immediately, is shown by the trees, trunks, 
and branches that project out of the coal, and are 
imbedded in the sandstone, shale, and limestone that 
lie above. Many of them rise to such a height as to 
pass through six, eight, or ten strata, and show by 
the perfect preservation of their forms, that they were 
enveloped to their tops before they had begun to 
undergo decay. The wood is usually silicified, while 
the bark is converted into coal. In some localities 
large fields, or forests of trees and stems standing 
erect in the places in which they grew, are found 
enveloped in a series of sandstones, shales, and lime- 
stones; indicating that 'Rye, six, or seven of those 
strata were deposited in very quick succession ; as 
otherwise those trees would exhibit marks of decay. 
How could they have been thus preserved, if, as the 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 369 

common tlieorj represents, hundreds, and perhaps 
tliousands of years were employed in their burial, 
and they were during that period exposed to the 
action of destructive agents, sufficiently powerful, as 
is held, to disintegrate solid rocks and convert them 
into the strata ? Six, eight, or ten of the layers were 
sometimes formed, not improbably, in half the num- 
ber of years. The rapidity with which they were 
deposited in those instances was, at least, such, that 
if it were the ordinary rate, sixteen or eighteen hun- 
dred years would be ample for the deposition of the 
whole series. 

The condition of the fossilized animal relics indi- 
cates also that the strata in which they are entombed 
were deposited with rapidity. The perfect preserva- 
tion, in many localities, of the forms of fish, shows that 
they were covered by the strata in which they are 
imbedded before decomposition had begun, or they 
had been exposed to mutilation by other fish. 

'' The perfect condition in which the impressions of fish 
are found in the rock of Monte Bolca, and their extraor- 
dinary abundance, seem to show that the catastrophe which 
destroyed them was a sudden one, such as might have been 
brought about by the evolution of some of the noxious 
gases exhaled from volcanoes. I have myself observed the 
speedy extinction of life which takes place when carbonic 
acid is introduced into a vessel in which fish of several dif- 

16* 



370 THE MATEEIALS OF THE STRATA, 

ferent kinds are collected ; tlie first operation of the gas 
causing them to leap out of the water with convulsive 
energy, but in a few seconds, all muscular energy being sus- 
pended, all the fish without any further effort sinkmg life- 
less to the bottom of the tub.'' — Dauhney's Description of 
Active and Extinct Volcanoes, p. 146. 

The skeletons of those of considerable size are often 
unmutilated, and dispersed througii strata that cover 
extensive areas. That wonld naturally happen, if the 
clay or lime that enveloped them was thrown down 
in a few hours, or even a few days ; but could not, 
had scores, and, perhaps, hundreds of years, as the 
common theory represents, been occupied in their 
deposition. Do dead fish now fioat in the ocean, or 
welter at the bottom, months and years without 
decay, and without mutilation by the living? Do 
their skeletons long remain unbroken, if exposed to 
the dash of breakers, and the wear of powerful waves, 
currents, and tides ? If not, why should it any more, 
in contravention of the most certain physical laws, be 
supposed that they did then ? 

The condition in which the solid parts of testaceous 
and other similar animals are found, indicates with 
equal clearness that they were rapidly inclosed in 
the mass in which they are imbedded. Shells and 
corals, in infinite numbers, are found wholly un- 
broken. 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 371 

" The old fresh-water and sea-bottoms present us with 
the occurrence of animal remains so preserved, and amid 
such substances, that the sudden influx of waters charged 
with much fine matter in mechanical suspension may have 
destroyed multitudes of aqneous animals in some given 
area. At least their remains are so entangled amid this 
matter as to lead to this inference. That fixed creatures or 
others of slow movements could thus readily be over- 
whelmed, would be expected under such conditions at all 
geological periods. When, for example, in the vicinity of 
Bradford, the Apiocrinites of that locality is found rooted 
upon a subjacent calcareous bed, one of the oolitic series, 
and entangled in a seam of clay, its parts sometimes beau- 
tifully preserved, it may be inferred that it was destroyed 
by an influx of mud from which it could not escape. In 
like manner, also, the preservation of long uninjured stems 
of various encrinites fouad amid the Silurian and other older 
deposits, on the surfaces of limestone and other rocks, and 
having had a covering of fine sediment, would appear to be 
explained. Sometimes, as in the Lias of Golden Cope, 
near Lyme Regis, multitudes of belemnites, some with even 
the ink-bag of these molluscs preserved, so form a seam of 
organic remains, that the observer is led to infer a sudden 
destruction of thousands of them over a moderate area. 
Ammonites are also sometimes found in great numbers, 
distributed in a depth of only a few inches, over areas of a 
square mile or more, as if suddenly destroyed. ... It 
sometimes happens that the shells of molluscs show that 
when their animals were entombed, the space occupied by 



372 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

their bodies prevented the entrance of the sediment which 
enveloped them. . . . Multitudes of examples are 
found in certain areas and deposits where the presence of 
the animals in their shells should seem required. When we 
consider the probable voracity of numerous creatures in 
fresh and sea waters, and the multitudes of scavenger ani- 
mals consuming decayed animal matters at all geological 
times, the discovery of certain aqueous reptiles preserved 
entire amid rocks, even with the contents of their intestines 
preserved, leads us to infer that their entombment, if not 
also their death, was sudden. And this appears the more 
probable when we find, as often happens, that in the same 
deposits the same kinds of aqueous reptiles are dismembered, 
as if by predaceous animals feeding upon them. "While, at 
times, in the lias of Western England, the skeletons of 
Ichthyosauri and Plesiosauri, are so well preserved, that all 
or nearly all the bones are in their proper places ; at others 
the bones of these reptiles are dispersed, though not always 
far removed from the place where the animals died. In 
fact the appearances presented are precisely those of decom- 
position having been so far advanced, that the scavenger 
animals could feed upon the carcases, and drag the bones 
short distances, so as somewhat to scatter them." — De La 
Beckers Geological Observer, pp. 515, 516. 

The preservation of such multitudes of animals of 
all orders unmutilated, which admits of no solution, 
except on the supposition that they were suddenly 
destroyed and immediately buried, thus indicates 



DERIVED FliOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 373 

decisively that the strata in which they are enveloped 
were deposited with rapidity. Is there any reason to 
believe that the unfossiliferous strata were not con- 
structed with equal expedition? ISTone whatever. 
All their features indicate that they had their origin 
in the same causes, and were formed under the same 
conditions. 

QUESTIONS. 

But were these agents of sufficient energy to transfer those sub- 
stances to the surface in the period that is represented in Genesis, to 
have passed between the creation and the modification of the earth's 
surface at the flood ? Was that period as adequate, as any greater 
one ? Is it clear that the requisite materials existed within the globe 
at every point where they were needed, to be ejected for the con- 
struction of the strata? What is the proof of it? Is it clear that 
where those substances were deposited, expulsive forces must have 
been generated and thrown them out in vast masses on the surface ? 
Give the proof of it. By what supposition in respect to Lake Supe- 
rior, can this be illustrated ? 

These facts show that the materials of the strata may have thus 
been ejected from the interior of the earth : are there any considera- 
tions which indicate that they were in fact derived from that quarter ? 
What is the first ? Are volcanic rocks found in almost every part 
of the globe? Mention some of the principal countries. Have 
igneous rocks been driven up to the surface in still more numerous 
places? Do these facts show that such agents have been at work in 
the depths of the planet in every considerable region, as might have 
ejected the materials of the strata, and spread them by the waters of 
the ocean wherever they are found ? What is the next fact by which 
this is corroborated ? Can the distribution of the different substances 
of which the strata consist into separate layers and groups, be 
accounted for on any other supposition, than that they were separated 



374: THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA, 

from each other in the depositories from which they were drawn ? 
If thrown up successively from separate repositories, would they 
naturally be deposited from the waters of the ocean in separate 
layers ? If introduced into the ocean in that manner, would the 
slight intermixture of them naturally take place, that is now seen in 
the strata ? What is the third fact which gives confirmation to this 
view ? Show how, if injected into the waters of the sea in the manner 
we have supposed, they would be diffused over wide areas. "What 
may be presumed to have been their form when ejected into the 
ocean? Did their union in granules and larger bodies take place 
then probably or at a later period ? 

What explanations of important phenomena are furnished by these 
views that corroborate their truth? Could such elevations and 
depressions of the rocky surface of the earth as exist, have taken 
place, had the globe been as many geologists hold it once was, in 
a state of fusion ? State the reason. How is it that heat and expan- 
sive gases are generated ? Is all the latent heat evolved in matter 
that is in a state of perfect fusion? Were the interior of the globe 
in a state of fusion, would it necessarily be in a state of repose, so for 
as the generation of gases is concerned? Would volcanoes, be 
impossible in such a globe? Is this consideration overlooked by 
the geologists, who hold that the earth is now a molten ocean, except 
a thin rocky crust which forms its surface ? Are the phenomena of 
earthquakes, volcanoes, and the elevation and dislocation of the 
surface, explicable on the views we have advanced ? Show how these 
great processes may have been produced. Does this view of the 
causes of these great movements allow of their repetition as often 
as the strata indicate that they have taken place ? Show how. 

Do these views suggest an explanation of the great accumulation 
of vegetable matter in the localities where coal exists ? Is it appa- 
rent that the materials generally, of which coal beds are formed, did 
not grow in the places where the coal lies? What is the proof of 
that fact? Is it clear also that the whole materials of a bed, must 
have been deposited at once, not slowly accumulated? What is the 



DEEIVED FEOM THE INTEEIOK OF THE EARTH. 375 

proof of that fact ? Can they have been borne to the places where 
they were buried, by rivers ? Why not ? What then is the only 
force that could have swept them together? State in what manner 
it might happen. How does it appear that the materials of the coal 
beds were deposited in a short space ? How does it appear that the 
strata which lie next above the coal, were immediately formed over 
them ? What indicates that the strata in which the relics of animals 
are buried, were deposited with rapidity ? What is the testimony of 
Mr. Daubney respecting it ? Would the larger animals have decayed 
if they had not been immediately involved in the earthy and mineral 
matter in which their remains are preserved? Does the condition 
also of shells indicate that they were buried suddenly in the beds of 
mud which were their birth-place and residence ; not swept from 
them by violent currents and long exposed to erosion and fractures 
before being interred in the strata in which they are nov/ found ? 
What is the testimony of Sir T. H. De La Beche respecting it ? Do 
all these facts confirm the view we have advanced, by showing that 
the strata were formed with rapidity ? 



376 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 



CHAPTEE XYI. 

The Materials of the Strata derived from the Interior of the Earth. 

This view of the mode in whicli the materials of the 
strata were introduced into the oceans and seas, sug- 
gests the probable reason that those animals that were 
invested with a covering of silex or lime, swarmed at 
periods in certain localities, in infinite numbers. The 
infusion into the waters of the ocean at those points, 
of the elements of which their shells are formed, per- 
haps at a temperature equal to or above that of the 
equatorial seas, and that rendered their propagation 
practicable through the whole year, may have been 
the cause of their extraordinaiy multiplication. The 
slight animalcula whose silicious sheaths are in a few 
places accumulated in vast masses, cast their cover- 
ings periodically, and, like other creatures of that 
order, multiplied with a rapidity in an inverse ratio 
to their minuteness. The bulk of their relics is not 
greater, perhaps, in proportion to their power of 
increase, than that of some larger animals. There is, 
at least, no satisfactory explanation of their infinite 
multitude on any other theory. The supposition of 
vast ages during which they existed, is altogether 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 377 

inadmissible ; for tliey are not common to all geologi- 
cal times, but confined to periods of comparatively 
sliglit length ; and there are no indications that the 
strata formed contemporaneously with them, occupied 
a long round of ages. Myriads as innumerable as 
those of the infusoria that sometimes now animate 
every drop of the ocean through hundreds of cubic 
miles, casting their sheaths at slight intervals, would 
in a few years accumulate masses as great as those 
imbedded in the strata. 

It suggests a more probable solution than any other 
of the origin of rock salt, and the saliferous marls 
from which salt springs arise. Those marls were un- 
doubtedly ejected, like all others, from the interior of 
the earth ; and why should not the salt with which 
they are saturated have been ejected along with 
them ? We know that soda exists in the depths of 
the earth, as it is a conspicuous element in many of 
the volcanic rocks ; and chloride also, as it is an ele- 
ment of muriatic acid, which is one of the most com- 
mon and abundant of the gases emitted from volca- 
noes. 

'' Muriatic acid seems to be generated during almost all 
the phases of volcanic action ; for although some have 
attempted to establish a class of volcanoes to which the pro- 
duction of muriatic acid was peculiar, yet it would appear 
that there were none from which this gas is not in greater 
or less quantity disengaged." — Dauhney^s Description of 
Volcanoes, p. 60 1. 



378 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

Their ejection in combination, and in sucli condi- 
tions as to form rock salt, however it may transcend 
our comprehension, is no more incredible than many 
other processes, of the occurrence of which we have 
ample evidence. There is no other theory of its ori- 
gin that is not perplexed with insuperable objections. 

This Yiew of the rapidity with which the strata 
were formed, is confirmed by the softness and pliancy 
which they appear universally to have retained, till 
the time of their upheaval. That they were so soft 
when elevated as to be susceptible of flexion without 
breaking, is seen from the curvatures and contortions 
to which those of every species, especially from gneiss 
up to the last of the shales, sandstones, limestones, 
and coal beds of the carboniferous system, have been 
subjected. 

'' Contorted strata are common on the skh'ts or flanks of 
many mountain chains, appearing to show that before the 
latter attained their existing forms, there was a pressure 
from the central parts outward, causing the lateral contor- 
tions. 

"To produce this effect — as in the Alps, between Rigi 
and the Hospice of St. Gothard — we seem compelled to 
suppose the whole mass of the calcareous Alps — a series of 
mixed strata of limestone, argillaceous slates, shales, and 
sandstone, the former predominating — to have been in a 
yielding or comparatively soft state. We can scarcely sup- 
pose with any approach to probability, that the soft, yield- 
Ido; condition of this mass should have continued sufficiently 



DERB^ED FliOM THE INTEI^IOIi OF Tim EAKTH. 379 

long to enable a succession of small shocks, of no greater 
intensity than those of a modern earthquake, to have acted 
upon it. The whole strongly impresses us with the idea of 
a powerful exertion, forcing the limestone and associated 
beds outwards." — H. T. De La Beche's Thtord. Geology, pp. 
113, 114. 

In some instances tliey form a simple cnrve ; in 
others a series of cnrves, like so many waves ; in 
others still they are folded over like a half dozen of 
the letter S joined in a continnons line. The folding, 
in some localities, is on so great a scale, that the strata 
must either have been drawn from a distance, or else 
greatly expanded in length and breadth. In some 
parts of the Alleghanies the coal series within a half 
dozen square miles, would, if spread out on a level, 
cover two or three times that space. 

" The most probable condition of contortion appears to 
be pressure of solid matter on yielding stratified substances, 
which, while they bend, also dide to a certain extent on the 
planes of stratification." — II. T. De La Beckers Theoretical 
Ckology, p. 121. 

Ko such softness and pliancy are retained by the 
stratified or crystallized rocks that now lie beneath 
the surface, however far they may be below the lino 
of the sea. Though permeated by moisture, and, 
when first raised to the atmosphere, far more easily 
sawn or wrouo-lit with the chisel than after the water 



380 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

with wliicli they are charged has evaporated, they yet 
are not sufficiently flexible to be bent without frac- 
ture. As, then, they must have continued in a pliant 
state till their upheaval was completed and they were 
moulded into their present form, it is manifest that 
their elevation must have taken place rapidly. It 
cannot have proceeded, as many geologists maintain, 
by such slow stages, as to have been prolonged 
through a series of ages. If protracted after emerg- 
ing from the ocean through even a few years, the heat 
beneath of the molten mass of granite by which they 
were forced upwards, and the action of the sun and 
atmosphere, would have desiccated and hardened 
them to such a degree as to have rendered them inca- 
pable of beiog bent into curves and folds without 
breaking into fragments. We have the most decisive 
evidence, therefore, that their upheaval was accom- 
plished in a brief period ; and that the vast round of 
years which geologists have regarded as requisite to 
that process, is wholly imaginary. 

Tlieir upheaval and subjection in that pliant state 
to the powerful breakers, waves, and currents of the 
ocean, explain the denudations which they have un- 
dergone. Had they possessed their present hardness 
when rising through the ocean into the atmosphere, 
no such immense wearing away and such vast excava- 
tions as have been wrought in them would have been 
possible. 



DEEIYED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 381 

"Of the formations comprising the rocks of this portion 
of the State, ii. and in., are a limestone and slate stratum, 
which are at all times more destructible than sandstone ; 
but especially so must they have been in their soft and 
pulpy state at the time of their elevation from the bed of 
the ocean in which they were deposited. Hence they have 
been more deeply excavated than the harder ponderous beds 
of sandstone, of which formation iv. consists. We accord- 
ingly find formations ii. and iii. always in the deep and 
nearly level valleys, and iv. in the high and steep mountain 
ridges. Of the other rocks, formation v. consists chiefly of 
soft slates and calcareous slates. Formation vi., of Ume- 
stone, which, like ii , was evidently of a very soft consistence 
when first uplifted, and formation viii. of a mass of slate 
and argillaceous rocks. This would all be hable to very 
extensive destruction whenever subterraneous uplifting forces 
should bring them within the reach of those tremendous 
currents, which those same uplifting actions set in motion." 
— H. D. Rodgers's Report on the Geology of Pennsylvania, 
1838, p. 41. 

The sea does not now wear the solid rocks that lie 
embosomed hi it, or rise from its surface, except in a 
few positions where exposed to the most powerful 
breakers and currents ; and there what it rends and 
wears away is scarcely appreciable^ compared to the 
masses that meet the shock of its powerful enginery 
century after century without yielding. Myriads of 
ages would have contributed little towards grind- 



382 THE MATEPwIALS OF THE STRATA, 

ing down strata of sucli hardness, scores, hundreds, 
and even thousands of feet in thickness, over wide 
areas, scooping out valleys, and ploughing the broad 
passages betwixt the hills, in the bottom of which 
rivers cut their channels. Sut that immense rending 
and denudation was the natural result of the rapid 
upheaval of the strata from a level benecith the sea, 
in a condition so pliant as to yield to the violent cur- 
rents and waves which that process itself must have 
created, and the resistless sweep and dash of ocean- 
tempests and storms. Under the impulse of those 
powerful agents, the parts most elevated would at 
many points be instantly swept away, and where a 
whole continent, like that of South America, rose at 
the same time, so as to cause the ocean to recede with 
a resistless rush hundreds and thousands of miles, its 
currents would necessarily tear up and bear off the 
strata over extensive regions. Instead of vast ages 
and incalculable periods, a very brief time, therefore, 
would be ample for the accomplishment of all the 
great modifications of that class to which the strata 
have been subjected. The cuttings, accordingly, 
through hills, the excavations of valleys, and the 
removal of strata from large districts, and deposit of 
the detritus in others, are precisely such as would 
naturally result from the vehement commotion and 
violent currents of the ocean acting on such suscepti- 
ble materials. On the prevalent theory, however. 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTERIOK OF THE EARTH. 383 

tliey are wholly inexplicable. If tlie strata on the 
tops and sides of the mountains and hills, and on the 
plains and depressed surfaces, were as hard at their 
upheaval from the ocean as they now are, no solution 
could be given of the vast degradation that has taken 
place at many points in rocky ranges and plateaus, 
the abrasion of solid masses from wide plains, and the 
scooping out of deep channels and valleys between 
the hills, arranged in the same relations to each other, 
and exhibiting the same outlines as those that are 
now wrought in yielding soils by deluges and floods 
that sweep over them. 

The soft condition of the strata at their upheaval 
into the atmosphere, indicates the reasons also of the 
excavations within a brief period by rivers of their 
deep channels for miles through rocky strata. Thus 
the IS'iagara must naturally have cut its passage back 
from Lake Ontario to near its present fall in the 
lapse of a few years ; inasmuch as the strata over 
which it passed were at first so pliant as easily to 
yield to the powerful impulse of the current and cata- 
ract. That that was their state, is indisputable, not 
only from the fact that the strata generally were un- 
hardened at their upheaval, but that the same forma- 
tions on the Helderberg and the Appalachians were 
actually subjected to curvatures and contortions, that 
show that under the surge and dash of such a mass 
of waters as the iJ^iagara, they would have given way 



384 THE MATERIALS OF THE STKATA. 

in a moment, and dissolving into their primitive par- 
ticles, been borne off by the resistless current. To 
suppose that a long round of ages, or even a consider- 
able number of years, could have been exhausted in 
excavating such a chasm in strata in that condition, 
is a consummate solecism. The length and depth of 
the channel, instead of proving that a long period elap- 
sed during its excavation, present a resistless demon- 
stration that no more time can have been occupied by 
it than passed between the upheaval of the strata and 
their acquiring such a measure of hardness as to ena- 
ble them to resist, as they now do, the impulse of the 
waters. It is truly surprising that geologists, though 
aware of the evidences that the strata, at their eleva- 
tion, were tender and plastic, should yet wholly over- 
look it in their theories of erosion and denudation, 
and proceed in their inferences respecting the time 
that was required for those processes, on the assump- 
tion that the rocks that have been swept off, or cut by 
deep gorges, must from the first have had all their 
present hardness. 

The plastic condition of the rocks at the elevation 
of the mountains furnishes an explanation of the for- 
mation of the rounded stones, pebbles, and much, 
probably, of the gravel that are found in the vicinity 
of tlie great ranges, as the Cordilleras of South Ame- 
rica, the Rocky Mountains, the Appalachians, and the 
Alps. At their sudden upheaval, chasms were 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 385 

opened in tliem doubtless, and explosions of gas, and 
not improbably of lava, took place, by wliicli portions 
of tbe rocks through which they forced their way up- 
wards were torn into fragments, and projected with 
a rotary motion into the surging and rushing waters 
of the ocean, in the whirl of which they were borne 
off to a distance ere they reached the bottom, and 
stripped in the process of their angles and points, and 
reduced to a circular or elliptical form. Their round- 
ing was then soon completed by the ceaseless change 
of position and wear to which they continued to be 
subjected by the advance and recession of powerful 
waves, while the areas on which they lie were up- 
heaving towards the atmosphere, and the ocean 
retreating to its present bed. It is noticeable that 
these vast bodies of stones, pebbles, and gravel lie at 
the eastward of the mountain range from which they 
were derived. Thus in Patagonia : 

'' Here — in Patagonia — in the tertiary formations — along 
hundreds of miles of coast, we have one great deposit, includ- 
ing many tertiary shells all apparently extinct. These beds 
are covered by others of a peculiar soft white stone, includ- 
ing much gypsum, and resembling chalk, but really of a 
pumiceous nature. It is highly remarkable, from being 
composed, to at least one tenth part of its bulk, of infusoria. 
This bed extends 500 miles along the coast, and probably 
for a considerably greater distance. At Port Julian its 
thickness is more than 800 feet I These white beds are 

17 



386 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

everywhere capped by a mass of gravel, forming, probably, 
one of the largest beds of shmgle in the world ; it certainly 
extends from near the Rio Colorado to between 600 and 
TOO nautical miles southwest ; at Santa Cruz, a river a 
little north of St. Julian, it reaches to the foot of the Cor- 
dillera ; half way up the river, its thickness is more than 
200 feet ; it probably everywhere extends to this great 
chain, 'whence the well rounded pebbles of porphyry have been 
derived. We may consider its average breadth as 200 miles, 
and its average thickness as about fifty feet. If this great 
bed of pebbles, without including the mud necessarily derived 
from their attrition, was piled into a mound, it w^ould form 
a great mountain chain !" — Darwin's Journal of Researches 
in Natural History and Geology in the Voyage of the Beagle, 

pp. 170, m. 

" Near the mouth of the Santa Cruz the bed of gravel is 
from twenty to about thirty-four feet in thickness. The 
pebbles vary from minute ones to the size of a hen's egg, 
and even to that of half a man's head. They consist of 
paler varieties of porphyry than those found further north- 
ward, and there are fewer of the gallstone yellow kind ; 
pebbles of compact black clay slate were here first observed. 
The gravel covers the step-formed plains at the mouth, 
head, and on the sides of the great valley of the Santa Cruz. 
At the distance of 110 miles from the coast, the plain has 
risen to the height of 1416 feet above the sea, and the 
gravel, with the associate great boulder formation, ha3 
attained a thickness of 212 feet. The plain, apparently 
with its usual gravel covering, slopes up to the foot of the 



DEKIVED mOM THE INTEKIOR OF THE EAKTH. 387 

Cordillera to the height of between 3200 and 3300 feet. 
In ascending the valley, the gravel gradually becomes 
entirely altered in character ; high up we have pebbles of 
crystalline felspathic rocks, compact clay-slates, quartzose 
schists, and pale-colored porphyries ; these rocks, judging 
from the gigantic boulders on the surface, and from some 
small pebbles imbedded beneath 700 feet in thickness of 
tertiary strata, are the prevailing kinds in this part of the 
Cordillera : pebbles of basalt from the neighboring streams 
of basaltic lava are also numerous." 

* ^ * * ¥: * 

" The transportal and origin of this vast bed of pebbles 
is an interesting problem. From the manner in which they 
cap the step-formed plains, worn by the sea within the period 
of existing shells, their deposition, at least on the plains up 
to a height of 400 feet, must have been a recent geological 
event. From the form of the continent, we may be sure 
they have come from the westward, probably in chief part 
from the Cordillera, but perhaps partly from unknown rocky 
ridges in the central districts of Patagonia. That the peb- 
bles have not been transported by rivers from the interior 
towards the coast, we may conclude from the fewness and 

smallness of the streams of Patagonia That 

the pebbles in central and northern Patagonia have not 
been transported by ice-agency, .... we may con- 
clude from the absence of all angular fragments in the 
gravel, and from the complete contrast in many other res- 
pects between the shingle and the neighboring boulder for- 
mation. 



THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 



" Looking to the gravel oa any one of the step-formed 
plains, I cannot doubt, .... that it has been spread 
out and levelled by the long continued action of the sea, 
probably daring the slow rise of the land." — Darwin's Geo- 
logical Observations on South America, pp. 20-22. 

Beds of pebbles and gravel, formed of quartz, 
gneiss, and primary slate, are strewn in mnch the 
same manner on tlie Atlantic side of the Appala- 
chians in Yirginia. 

'' The loose aggregation and coarse materials of those 
beds give them so great a resemblance to the common dilu- 
vium of sand and gravel, generally forming the surface 
strata in this part of the State, as to render careful obser- 
vation necessary in order to distinguish between them ; and 
even the closest inspection in some cases will not suffice for 
this purpose. This obscurity, however, does not apply to 
localities in which the tertiary beds are seen resting upon 
them, as in such cases the subjacent position of the sand- 
stone or conglomerate determines its true geological charac- 
ter, the diluvial sand or gravel having its place above the 
tertiary. 

" When the tertiary, .... having been removed, 
. . . has been replaced by diluvial sand and gravel 
deposited on the broken surface of the secondary," still, " a 
marked difference may be noticed in their composition, espe- 
cially in the comparatively large amount of white felspathic 
earth blended with the coarser matter of the upper second- 



DEEIVED FEOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 389 

ary. Indeed, at most localities, however large may be the 
pebbles imbedded in some of the layers, the intervening 
matter will be found to possess the character of a soft fels- 
pathic sandstone, and some portions of the mass will display 
this character throughout. 

'' The pebbles thus imbedded in the finer material of these 
beds, sometimes in layers of many feet in thickness, but 
oftener in narrow courses, are frequently of great size, mea- 
suring even as much as eight or ten inches in diameter. 
They are of very various origin ; some being from the primary 
region, and consisting of quartz, gneiss, and primary slates, 
while others are from the formations further west, and espe- 
cially that lying on the valley (west) side of the Blue Ridge, 
and which I have designated as the first of the series of 
rocks of our great Appalachian system. These fragments 
of formation i., remarkable for their bright white color and 
their great magnitude, serve to distinguish the mass in 
which they occcur from the overlying diluvium, in which 
nothing analogous has as yet been discovered. Forming 
thus a part of what may be considered as ancient diluvium 
belonging to the secondary era, they point to the extensive 
agency of the currents by which the heterogeneous materials 
of these upper secondary strata were swept together." — 
Rodger sh Repori on the Geology of Virginia, 1839, pp. 36, 
3t. 

See also p. 60 for a description of similar conglome- 
rates and sandstones in tlie northern district east of 
the Blue Ridge. 

That these immense masses were thus swept 



390 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

towards the east, indicates tliat a resistless rusli of 
tlie ocean took place in that direction at the upheaval 
of the mountains from which they were hurled by 
volcanic explosions, or torn by the surge and sweep 
of the waters. This and the transportation of the 
pebbles to such a distance, may have arisen in a mea- 
sure from the elevation of the western side of the 
continent first. If, instead of being raised through- 
out at the same time, it was elevated first at the 
western side, so as to form a slope beneath the sea, 
descending one, two, or three miles towards the east, 
the sudden upheaval of the Cordilleras to within a 
few hundred feet of the atmosphere, would have 
thrown the vast mass of waters that before rested on 
the plains of Patagonia, Buenos Ayres, and Brazil, 
towards the Atlantic, so as to have drawn after them 
a current from the Pacific of hundreds of times the 
force with which it surges in an. ordinary tempest, 
and swept the fragments ejected from the interior, 
and wrenched from the summit and sides of the 
mountain, to the distance of many miles ; and its 
ceaseless waves would then, at every roll along the 
inclining bottom, have borne them still further into 
the depths. These stupendous processes, which w^ere 
wholly impossible on the prevailing theory, might 
thus have been dispatched in a very brief period, 
instead of occupying the interminable ages which 
geologists assign them. 



DERIVED FROM THE mXEEIOR OF THE EARTH. 391 

These views of tlie period at which the strata were 
formed, and of the causes of the submersion of the 
land beneath the sea, and the retreat of tlie sea from 
the land, indicate the reason that no human remains 
are found fossilized in the strata. Geologists gene- 
rally allege the fact that no relics of the human race 
are buried in the rocks in which so many animals of 
the sea and land are entombed, as a decisive proof 
that man was not created till after these rocks were 
formed. That conclusion, however, is without any 
just ground. There is no reason to suppose that ante- 
rior to the flood, any of the human family lived in 
this hemisphere, in Europe, or in those parts of Asia 
or Africa, in which the strata have been examined. 
How, then, could their remains be entombed in the 
rocks of those regions? Tlie strata, moreover, that 
now form the crust of the continents and islands, in 
the main, lay undoubtedly, previous to the deluge, 
beneath the sea, and were formed, at least chiefly, 
during the interval from the creation to that catas- 
trophe. The primitive earth, occupied by the first 
pair and their descendants down to the flood, was 
then submerged — and doubtless by its own subsi- 
dence — and still continues to lie at the bottom of the 
ocean. For how could it have sunk beneath the 
waters to so great a depth, unless on the one hand by 
its being depressed below the line it had before occu- 
pied, and on the other, by a corresponding elevation 



392 THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA, 

of the bed of the former sea ? But such a subsidence 
of that ancient earth would have caused the ocean to 
rush on to it from every side, and carried its popula- 
tion and all other movable things from its exterior 
towards its centre, where they would naturally have 
sunk along with the wreck of their dwellings, fields, 
and forests, and been buried beneath the mud and 
sand with which the rushing waters would have 
become charged. To suppose that their bodies could 
have disentangled themselves from such a compli- 
cated mass, and floated off against the cm-rent to the 
other hemisphere, is to contradict the physical laws 
to which they and the movements of the ocean must 
have been subject. The total absence from the strata 
of this country, of Europe, of Africa, and Asia, of the 
relics of those then destroyed, is precisely therefore 
what was to be expected from the time and mode of 
their destruction. How could their remains be 
entombed in those strata which had been deposited 
hefore the epoch of the deluge, that swept them to 
their watery sepulchre ? How could they obtain a 
burial in the seas where these strata were formed, 
when their distance was so great as to preclude their 
being borne to them ? How extensive the continent, 
or continents and islands, of that world were, we have 
no means of judging. It is highly probable that they 
were of but moderate dimensions at their elevation 
on the third day of the creation ; and they may have 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTEKIOE OF THE EARTH. 393 

been enlarged at subsequent periods, as the race mul- 
tiplied, and still have been at the time of their sub- 
mergence, at the deluge, greatly inferior in extent to 
the present dry land. On that supposition, portions 
of the present continents might have been elevated 
into the atmosphere sufficient to have borne the vege- 
table growths out of which the coal beds were 
formed, without rendering the aggregate of the dry 
land greater than it is now. 

It is highly probable, also, that at the reappearance 
of dry land at the close of the deluge, the extent of 
the Asiatic continent, raised above the ocean, was 
comparatively small ; and that the great processes by 
which the strata generally were completed, and the 
continents and islands elevated to their present posi- 
tions, were continued through a considerable period 
after that event. And it may have been in reference 
to such a gradual reconstruction of the crust of the 
earth, that animals were preserved in the ark, not- 
withstanding — as there is reason to believe — there 
were to be new creations to stock the remote regions 
of Asia, and other continents and islands which were 
to be prepared to be peopled with animals more 
rapidly than those from the ark could multiply ; or 
from their distance, the impassable barriers with 
which they were surrounded, and their different cli- 
mates, were to require a creation on their own soil 
of peculiar genera and species. While, therefore, the 

17^ 



394: THE MATEEIALS OF THE STRATA, 

animals preserved in the ark may have been suffi- 
cient in kinds and numbers to supply the wants of 
IToah and his family, and stock that part of the earth 
that was first raised above the sea ; as other countries 
became fitted to support the same or other tribes, 
those with which they were peopled may have been 
called into existence by a new fiat. And on this sup- 
position the existence in Europe, ISTorthern Asia, 
Africa, and this continent, of the land animals whose 
relics are fossilized in the strata, is rendered consis- 
tent with the sacred history of the creation and deluge. 
These animals existed undoubtedly after the deluge, 
not anterior to it. Some of the species of Europe and 
Africa that were the most active, and best adapted to 
live in different climes, may have migrated from the 
East ; but most were probably created in the regions 
where they perished. If during the two or thre-e 
hundred years that followed the flood, Northern Asia, 
Europe, Africa, and America, emerged from the 
ocean, portions of them being gradually drained of 
their waters, and portions again submerged, or over- 
flowed by deluges occasioned by the sudden elevation 
of other tracts ; there was ample space for the life 
and destruction of the land animals whose remains 
are buried in the upper tertiary strata, gravel, and 
soil of these regions that were formed after the eleva- 
tion, at least in a considerable measure, of their great 
mountain ranges. 



DEEIYED FEOM THE INTERIOK OF THE EAETH. 395 

The fact that certain classes of animals appear to 
have passed out of existence during the formation of 
the strata, and other forms of marine life and land 
animals that had not before inhabited the same 
regions were called into existence, and in their turn 
swept away also, is indeed alleged by some as a deci- 
sive proof that vast periods must have been occupied 
by these changes. No conclusion, however, could 
be more unnatural. Yast periods surely were not 
required for the creation of animals. They are 
instantly called into being by the word of the 
Almighty ; and not in single pairs, like the progeni- 
tors of the human race, but in crowds, as at the first 
creation of the tenants of the air and the water, when 
the waters were commanded to " bring forth abun- 
dantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl 
that may fly above the earth in the open firmament 
of heaven ;" and the earth was commanded to " bring 
forth the living creature after his kind, cattle and 
creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind ;" 
which also, like the fish and fowl, were produced, 
doubtless, not solely in one locality, but wherever the 
earth was prepared to sustain them. Their creation 
shows, therefore, that instead of innumerable ages, 
only brief periods were required for their being called 
into existence. Nor is the extinction of certain classe-s 
any more a proof of a lapse of long periods ; as all 
appearances indicate that their destruction took place 



396 



by causes that were sudden and acted over great 
areas ; such, as the effusion of deadly gases into the 
ocean ; the eruption of vast masses of silex, alumine, 
lime, and other substances from the depths of the 
earth, that thickened the waters of the sea, and gene- 
rated chemical processes that were fatal to anim^ 
life. IvTor is there any reason to suppose that there 
were long intervals between the extinction of one 
series and the creation of its successors. The seas and 
lands were again repeopled, doubtless, as soon as the}' 
became fitted to be the residence of the tribes with 
which they were next stocked. The change of their 
population, therefore, by these rapid processes, instead 
of demanding a long round of ages, may have been 
accomplished in a short time. 

This supposition accounts also for the preservation 
of such of the relics of those animals as, instead of 
being entombed in the solid strata, were buried in the 
gravel or sands deposited above them, where they 
have been exposed to moisture and other chemical 
agents that were adapted to induce their decay. That 
bones of any species should be preserved in such con- 
ditions, through the vast series of ages which geologists 
assign to them-7-30,000 years. Sir C. Lyell assumes, 
have passed since the burial of the Mastodon found 
in the gravel near E"iagara — is physically impossible. 
If the same chemical forces that acted on that skele- 
ton disintegrated during that period immense masses 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 397 

of the most solid rocks, and bore tlieir detritus to the 
sea — as that writer holds — how is it that those bones, 
which were far more easily decomposed, should have 
withstood their destructive agency and survived 
almost unimpaired ? The two assumptions are incom- 
patible with each other. Many of the skeletons that 
are found buried in low grounds, bog*?, and swamps, 
are probably of a comparatively recent date. Others 
were doubtless of a much earlier age ; but four thou- 
sand years are probably as long a period as any of 
them could have been preserved without undergoing 
a greater measure of decay. 

Such are the facts and considerations that contirm 
the view we have presented of the formation of the 
strata. We might add many others ; but these are 
sufficient on the one hand to demonstrate the total 
error of the theory generally entertained by geolo- 
gists ; and on the other, to show that the strata, so 
far from off'ering any contradiction to the Mosaic 
record of the creation and deluge, are in entire har- 
mony with it, and indicate in all their great features 
that they were formed with a rapidity as great as that 
history implies. 

It will, perhaps, be said that althgugh the views 
we have advanced seem to be consistent with the laws 
of the physical world, and with the appearances of 
the strata ; and to show that all the great processes 
by which the crust of the earth received its present 



398 THE MATERIALS OF THE STRATA, 

form, may have been consHmmated within the period 
we have supposed — the 1,800 or 2,000 years that fol- 
lowed the creation — yet we have ]3i'oduced no abso- 
lute demonstration that such was the fiict ; and that, 
therefore, there is room to doubt that they were fin- 
ished in that period, and to suppose that they occu- 
pied a far greater series of ages. 

To this we reply, that it is not necessary to our 
object that we should demonstrate directly and abso- 
lutely from the strata themselves^ that they were com- 
pleted in that period. Our aim is to confute the 
representation, that the strata themselves present 
resistless evidence that they were formed at a far 
earlier epoch than that to which the Scriptures refer 
the creation of the world ; and thereby to protect the 
sacred word from the charge and suspicion of giving 
a false history of that event ; and that we accomplish 
by showing, in the first place, that the geological the- 
ory which ascribes an immeasurable age to the world, 
is altogether groundless and mistaken ; and in the 
next, that the materials of the strata were placed ori- 
ginally in such conditions, and acted on by such 
agents as rendered their transfusion into the ocean, 
and deposition and upheaval in their present form in 
a period of eighteen hundred or two thousand yeare, 
consistent with the great laws of those substances and 
agents, and possible therefore ; and thirdly, that their 
completion with such a rapidity is indicated and con- 



DEEIYED FEOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 399 

firmed by their structure and condition. In accom- 
plisliing that, we do all that is necessary to vindicate 
the Scriptures from the charge to which the geologi- 
cal theory of an immeasurable age of the world has 
given rise, that they are convicted by the facts of sci- 
ence of error ; and of an error so extraordinary and 
stupendous as to show that neither the history of the 
creation, nor any of the other professed communica- 
tions from God, which they contain, can have been 
written by inspiration. And these propositions we 
have demonstrated. We have shown that the theory 
which ascribes a vast age to the world cannot be true, 
because it is not supported by any proofs ; because if 
granted it could not account for the formation of the 
strata ; because it is against the laws themselves of 
matter ; and because it would preclude the occur- 
rence of any of the great processes by which the crust 
of the earth has been formed and modified ; such as 
earthquakes, the elevation of mountains, the eruption 
of volcanoes, the introduction of the materials of the 
strata into the ocean and dispersion over the areas 
where they lie, and the upheaval and dislocation of 
the strata after they were formed. A theory that 
presents such insuperable barriers to the accomplish- 
ment of these great processes cannot have any foun- 
dation in truth, nor present any solution of the facts 
which it is devised to explain. If the advocates of that 
theory are to demonstrate or render it probable that 



400 THE MATEEIALS OF THE STRATA, 

the earth has had a longer existence than is assigned 
to it bj the Scriptural history of its creation, it must 
be by means wholly different from those which they 
have hitherto employed for the purpose. 

The proofs are decisive also on the other hand, that 
the strata may have been formed within the period 
of eighteen hundred or two thousand years from the 
creation ; and all the features of the strata indicate 
that they were built with as great a rapidity, and 
completed within as recent a date, as that supposes ; 
and the establishment from the laws of the chemical 
and mechanical forces by which the structure and 
modification of the earth's crust have been produced, 
and from the nature and condition of the strata them- 
selves, of the possibility of such a rapid formation, is 
all that is requisite to exempt the Scriptures from the 
imputation of error in their narrative of the creation 
and deluge. For if such a construction of the crust 
of the globe is consistent with the laws of those forces, 
and is probable, then neither the extent and thick- 
ness of the strata, the substances of which they con- 
sist, the relics they imbed, their upheaval and dislo- 
cation, nor any other peculiarities which they exhibit, 
present any contradiction to the sacred history of 
their origin and date ; nor furnish any ground for an 
inference against the divine authority of that history, 
and the other parts of the sacred volume that are 
founded on it, and assume and ratify its truth. 



DEEIVED FEOM THE INTEKTOR OP THE EARTH. 401 

It is not to invalidate this conclusion, to say that 
we have not absolutely demonstrated /!r(?m the crust 
of the earth itself^ that it was wrought into its pre- 
sent shape within that period. To set that conclusion 
aside, they who dissent from it must prove directly 
and absolutely that the strata cannot have been 
formed, the igneous rocks thrown on to the surface, 
and the mountains upheaved in the manner, nor con- 
summated within the period we have represented. 
But that they cannot do, unless they can set aside the 
grounds on which we found that conclusion. But in 
order to that, they must show, first, that there are no 
proofs that any such stores of the various substances 
of which the present surface of the globe is con- 
structed, were originally treasured up in its interior, as 
that — ^on the supposition that there were proper agents 
for their transferrence to the surface — the strata 
might have been formed from them. But that they 
cannot show. It is against the most palpable facts. 
It is against their own admissions. It were to over- 
turn their own theories of the nature and origin of all 
the igneous rocks, which they themselves regard as 
of immeasurably greater bulk than the sedimentary 
strata. E'o certainty is more indisputable or holds a 
more important place in their speculations, than that 
the igneous rocks which were thrown up from the 
abysses of the planet are formed of identically the 
same substances as the sedimentary strata. They 
cannot deny, therefore, that all those elements were 



402 



originally stored in repositories in the interior of the 
earth, and on a scale sufficiently vast to have sup- 
plied all the materials that were requisite for the con- 
struction of the sedimentary strata, as well as the 
crystallized and volcanic rocks. 

As then that is indisputable, if they would set that 
conclusion aside, they must show that there were no 
agents that had access to those substances of sufficient 
power and activity to raise them into the ocean, that 
they might be deposited on its bottom and wrought 
into the strata in which they now exist. That, how- 
ever, they cannot any more prove ; as it is indisputa- 
ble that such agents in fact existed, and actually 
raised to the surface the vast masses of those sub- 
stances of which the igneous rocks are formed. This 
is acknowledged and maintained also by geologists, 
and is a conspicuous and important elernent of their 
theory. It is plain, moreover, that the fires of volca- 
noes, in forcing a passage from the deep recesses in 
which they were kindled to the atmosphere, must 
have driven up in an nnfused state immense volumes 
of the substances that lay between them and the sur- 
face ; and that those substances must have entered 
into the construction of the strata ; as otherwise they 
would have formed a separate body; but no such 
masses exist on the surface. The igneous rocks and 
the sedimentary strata constitute the whole crust of 
the globe. 

As then the requisite materials for the strata indis- 



DERIVED FEOM THE INTEKIOK OF THE EARTH. 403 

putably existed, originally, in the depths of the earth, 
and the requisite agents have existed and acted to 
transfer them to the waters of the ocean ; it cannot 
be proved that they were not in fact drawn from 
those sources, unless it can be shown that if they had 
been introduced into the ocean in that manner, they 
could not have been so diffused through the waters 
and deposited as to have formed the existing strata. 
But that cannot be proved. So far from it, their dif- 
fusion and deposition in separate layers, like those of 
the strata, is precisely what would naturally and 
necessarily take place, from the unfused and unce- 
mented condition of those substances on their infusion 
into the ocean, and from the action on them of gra- 
vity, and the motions and pressure of the water. To 
this, indeed, geologists cannot hesitate to assent ; as 
they re]3resent the materials of the strata as "having 
been transported by the tides and currents from the 
circumference of the ocean, where they suppose them 
to have been introduced by rivers, or beat off from 
rocky shores, into its interior, and thrown down on 
the areas where they were formed into the strata. 

As, then, neither of these great points of the view 
we have advanced can be disproved, no method 
remains of setting it aside, unless it can be shown 
that such a construction of the crust of the earth is 
inconsistent with or leaves unexplained some of the 
other great processes to which it has been subjected; 



40^ THE :5IATEEIAL3 OF THE STEATA, 

SHcli as tlie iiplieaval and dislocation of the sti-ata and 
tlie elevation of continents and mountains, or the 
incorporation in it of elements, such as the relics of 
vegetables and animals, that Trere not derived from 
the interior of the globe. But neither of these can 
any more be proved. Instead, all these extraordinary 
effects are precisely -^hat ^ould naturally result from 
such causes acting in such conditions, and could not 
have been produced by any other forces, nor in any 
other circumstances. They solve, accordingly, all 
the great processes that have taken place, and account 
for all the great results ; while, on the prevalent 
theory of a molten globe invested by a granite crust 
< — in which no new developments of an expansive 
force could take place, and thence no upheavals, no 
subsidences, no volcanoes, and no earthcj^uakes — they 
are inexphcable and impossible. 

As then those several positions are thus indisputa- 
ble, it is clear that there are no means of proving that 
the strata were not in fact formed by those agents 
and processes. Instead, their construction in that 
manner is not only altogether possible and probable, 
but they are the only agents and processes that were 
adequate to their production. All the facts of geo- 
logy are accordingly in harmony with the history 
given in Genesis of the creation and deluge. Xo 
means, therefore, exist of proving or rendering it 
l^robable that the world has existed through a 



DEEIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 405 

longer j)enod than that which is assigned to it by 
that inspired history ; and the Scriptures conse- 
quently are vindicated from the charge to which 
the specnlations of geologists have subjected them, 
of a contradiction to the discoveries and deductions 
of that science. 

The result at which we have aimed is thus esta- 
blished on indisputable and ample grounds. The facts 
of geology, in place of contradicting, corroborate the 
narrative in Genesis ; and the fancy that the Scrip- 
tures have been convicted of an error, demonstratiug 
that they cannot have proceeded from the God of 
nature, turns out to be wholly groundless and unjust. 

This great fact, free as it is from all rational doubt, 
of infinite moment to the credit of the Scriptures, and 
flashing an effulgent light over the whole domain of 
theology, demands the earnest consideration, espe- 
cially of the ministers of religion. The inspiration 
and authority of the sacred volume are boldly assailed, 
on the ground of the theory held by geologists of the 
immeasurable age of the world. That theory is un- 
doubtingly and exultingly claimed to be deduced 
from the facts of the science " according to the strict- 
est rules of the Baconian philosophy ;" and taken to 
be so, the conclusion is seen and felt by thousands 
and tens of thousands to be inevitable that neither the 
Pentateuch nor any other part of the Bible can have 
been written by the inspiration of the Almighty. 
That theory has been taught in lyceums, lecture- 



406 THE MATERIALS OF THE 8TEATA, 

rooms, pulpits, and books, almost without obstruction 
for half a century, until it has gained the assent very 
generally of the press, and acceptance in all ranks of 
society. It has become, accordingly, a prolific source 
and powerful auxiliary of scepticism ; and, unfortu- 
nately, has been aided in its mischievous influence, 
not only by the inconsiderate concessions of many 
religious men, but in a still worse manner by the un- 
justifiable and absurd methods by Vvdiich it has been 
attempted to bend the history of the creation in Gene- 
sis into harmony with their speculations, which con- 
tradict it, and impeach it of fatal error. 'No duty, 
therefore, is more urgent on those in the sacred oflice, 
than the rejection of those lawless perversions of the 
word of God, and confutation of the theory which 
assails its inspiration and veracity. The.y should no 
longer acquiesce in the seduction of their people — and 
especial 1}^ the young, who are eminently exposed to 
the danger — into doubt and unbelief, by the pretences 
of a superficial and but half matured science ; but 
boldly and resolutely point out its palpable fallacies, 
its flagrant contradictions to the laws of nature, and 
its inconsistency with the principles and facts of ge- 
ology ; and show, on the other hand, the proofs that the 
works of God are in harmony with his word. ISTo 
task is more incumbent on their profession ; none can 
be easier or of more interest and benefit to their 
people. 

And in this they will have the concurrence, we 



DKRIVED FEOM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 407 

trust, of good men among geologists tliemselves. 
The science manifestly needs a reconstruction. The 
completeness to which it has been advanced has been 
greatly over-estimated. There needs a clearer dis- 
crimination of that which is practical in it from 
that which is speculative — of the phenomena from 
the theories that are constructed to account for them. 
There needs a specific statement, which geologists 
have never yet given, of the axioms on which it is 
founded, and the principles by which reasonings and 
speculations respecting it are to be governed. There 
needs, especially, a rejection of unphilosophical 
assumptions and groundless hypotheses ; and among 
them, the theory of a world created in a state of gas 
or of fusion, invested with a granite covering, and 
continuing molten in the interior, which is the basis 
of the inference of a vast age of the planet, must be 
abandoned, as against the constitution of nature, at 
war with the facts it is employed to explain, and 
involving the science in endless self-contradiction and 
error. The results that are to be accounted for must 
be contemplated independently of hypotheses, in the 
light of the great truths which they themselves reveal 
respecting their origin, and of the agents that were 
concerned in their production, and such views alone 
adopted as are in harmony alike with causes, condi- 
tions, and effects. An effort, in short, needs to be 
made by its cultivators to free the science.from the 



408 THE MATERIALS OF THE STEATA, 

artificial and unnatural adjuncts with which it is now 
disfigured and embarrassed, to define its true princi- 
ples more clearly, to ascertain more adequately its 
facts, to limit its deductions to such as have a legiti- 
mate basis, and to unfold and verify its consistency — 
the certainty of which will advance proportionally 
with the progress that is made in real knowledge — 
with the revelation which God has given respecting 
the creation of the world, and the remodification 
through which it passed at the period of the flood. 

And in this reconstruction we sincerely hope those 
who are devoted to the cultivation of the science in 
this country will take an active part. !N"o finer field 
either for distinction or usefulness can present itself 
to the young men especially who are engaged in the 
profession. iSo superior theatre exists for the obser- 
vation of the strata. There is none where they 
are found through their whole series on a larger 
scale ; or yield more ample indications of the great 
processes by which they were formed. Let those, 
then, who have chosen the science as a profession, dis- 
miss the unfortunate theories by which it has hitherto 
been embarrassed, and aim at a reconstruction of it 
under the guidance of the great principles we have 
suggested ; and its facts will soon be unfolded in their 
proper relations, their true import be determined, 
and their consistency made apparent with the teach- 
ings of revelation. And this, instead of diminishing 



DERIVED FEOM THE mTEEIOE OF THE EAETH. 4:09 

the interest and value of the science, will add to its 
attractiveness, its dignity, and its usefnlness ; and, in 
place of an enemy, show it to be what it legitimately 
is, a natural and efficient auxiliary of religion. 

QUESTIONS. 

Does this view of the mode, in which the matter of the strata was 
introduced into the ocean, suggest the reason that the waters were 
so proliJBc of minute animals that were invested with coverings of 
silex and lime ? What is it ? Does this view suggest a solution of 
the origin of rock-salt ? What is it ? Is its origin explicable on the 
common theory ? What bearing on this view of the rapidity with 
which the strata were formed, has the softness which the strata 
appear to have retained at the time of their upheaval? What 
proof is there that they were then soft and pliable ? What are the 
various forms in which the strata are bent ? How is their being 
forced into this shape accounted for by De La Beche ? Do their 
flexures and contortions show that their upheaval must have been 
completed before they lost their pliancy, and therefore, that it must 
have taken place rapidly ? Does their upheaval while in a soft state 
furnish . an explanation of the denudations they have undergone ? 
What is the testimony of Professor Rogers, respecting it? Would 
the rapid elevation of hills and mountain ranges have created vio- 
lent currents and agitations of the ocean, which would necessarily 
have torn the strata up, if soft, and washed them off, from large 
areas? Could however, such erosions and denudations as they have 
undergone, ever have taken place, if, at the time of their upheaval, 
they had possessed their present hardness? Does their softness at 
their upheaval suggest the reason that rivers in a brief period cut 
their deep channels through rocky strata ? Might the Niagara have 
thus excavated its present bed back from Lake Ontario to the falls 
in a very brief period ? Is there any reason to believe it would ever 

IS 



410 THE MATEEIALS OF THE STEATA, 

have worn the rocks away ia sucli a form, had they not been in a 
plastic condition ? Does the elevation of the mountains while in a 
plastic state, suggest an explanation of the formation of the large 
masses of rounded stones and pebbles that are found in their vicinity? 
Explain the manner in which they may have been formed ? Do they 
abound on the slopes and at the feet of the Andes? Is it the judg- 
ment of geologists that they were derived from those mountains? 
State Mr. Darwin's views. Are they found in great masses at the 
feet of the Appalachians ? Does the distance from the high ranges 
of the mountains at which they are lodged, show that the currents 
by which they were borne there, must have rushed with great vio- 
lence ? 

Do these views indicate the reason that no human remains are 
found in the strata ? Do geologists allege that as a proof that man 
did not exist till after the strata were formed ? Is it a just ground 
for that conclusion ? Is there any reason to suppose that Europe 
or this country was inhabited by man before the flood ? As all our 
present mountains, as was shown in a former chapter, were raised 
from the ocean since the deluge, and as the strata with which they 
and the continents at large are covered, were formed beneath the 
ocean, is it not clear that the present continents and islauds, all of 
which are covered with the strata, must have continued to be buried 
in the ocean, at least most of the time till the deluge ; and if so, is 
not that a sufiScient reason that no human relics are found in the 
strata ? Is it not probable that the lands that were inhabited ante- 
rior to the flood, and were submerged at that catastrophe, were 
situated at a vast distance from Europe and this continent, and are 
now beneath the sea ? If so, does not that explain the non-existence 
of human remains in the strata of Europe and America? Is it not 
clear then, that the fact that no human remains are found in the 
strata of Europe or America, is no ground for the inference that man 
did not become an inhabitant of the world, till after these strata 
were formed? 

Is it not supposable that the area of the Asiatic continent at first 



DERIVED FROM THE INTERIOR OF THE EARTH. 411 

raised above the ocean after the deluge, was of moderate extent, and 
that the great processes by which the strata were completed, and 
the continents and islands elevated to their present positions, were 
continued for a period afterwards ? May it not have been because the 
earth was of but a narrow extent at its first emergence, and requiring 
but few animals to stock it, that so small a number was preserved in 
the ark ? May it not be presumed that as other regions were fitted 
for the residence of living creatures, they may have been called into 
existence by new creations? Does this supposition render the exist- 
ence of the land animals whose relics are fossilized consistent with the 
sacred history of the creation and the deluge ? Did those animals 
undoubtedly live after the deluge ? Would two, three, or four hun- 
dred years after the lands became generally inhabitable, have been 
sufficient for the growth of all the large animals, whose period is 
proved to have followed the deluge by the fact that their relics are 
buried in the upper strata and soil that were formed after the eleva- 
tion of the great mountain ranges, which took place as was shown in 
Chapter VII, after the flood ? Does the fact that certain classes of 
animals that once occupied the waters and the land, have disappeared, 
and others have taken their place, prove that long periods were 
occupied in those changes ? May not the destruction of those classes 
that have perished, have taken place rapidly ? Must not the crea- 
tion of their successors have taken place instantaneously? Does the 
freedom of many of the relics of the bulky animals from decay, indi- 
cate also, that their period cannot have been more remote than three 
or four thousand years ? Is it credible that bones of the Mastodon 
buried in the soil near Niagara, could continue there as Sir C. Lyell 
supposes, through thirty thousand years, without undergoing more 
than a slight decomposition ? Does not the perishable nature of those 
relics confute the supposition that they can have dated at an earlier 
period than the ages that immediately followed the flood ? Are these 
various facts then sufficient on the one hand, to confute the theory 
of the great age of the world ; and on the other, to show that the 
facts of the strata are consistent with the history in Genesis, of the 



412 THE STEATA FKOM THE INTERIOE OF THE EARTH. 

creation and deluge, and vindicate that record from the charge of 
error? Should it be said that though we have shown that the great 
processes of geology may have taken place in the manner we have 
indicated, we yet have not demonstrated that they took place in that 
manner ; what is the reply that should be made ? Is it enough for 
our object to show that the strata themselves do not prove the great 
age of the world ? What are the points by proving which we have 
established that? State how those points have been proved ? Is it 
enough for geologists to set aside our conclusion, that the facts of the 
strata are consistent with the history in Genesis, to say that we have 
not demonstrated from the strata themselves that they were formed 
since the epoch of the six days creation ? What must they prove to 
set that conclusion aside ? Must they not show that the strata can- 
not have been formed in the period and in the manner we have indi- 
cated? But can they show that the requisite materials did not exist 
in the depths of the earth ? Can they show that there were no agents 
sufficiently powerful and active to raise those materials to the sur- 
face? Can they show that if they had been ejected into the ocean, 
they could not have been so diffused and deposited, as to have formed 
the existing strata? Or can they show that such a construction of 
the crust of the earth, is inconsistent with any of the other processes 
to which it has been subjected ? If then, they cannot disprove any 
of those great facts, is it not manifest that they cannot prove that 
the strata were not formed in the manner we have represented ? And 
if they cannot prove that, is it not clear that they have no ground for 
their assumption, that the facts of the strata are irreconcilable with 
the Mosaic history of the creation and deluge ? 



THE END, 



THE 

THEOLOGICAL AND LITERARY 

JOURNAL. 

EDITED BY DAVID N. LORD. 

Issued quarterly, on 1st of July, October, January and April. 

SEVEN VOLUMES COMPLETED, OF 700 PAGES EACH. 

Price, $3 a year. 

PUBLISHED BY 

FRANKLIN KNI G H T , 

138 NASSAU STREET, N. Y. 



Besides Essays and Reviews on the modern 
doctrine of Geologists respecting tlie age of tlie 
world, there is in the Journal a series of articles 
on the principal philosophical and scientific the- 
ories of the period, that touch in a measure the 



186 CONTENTS. 

doctrines of theology ; — sucli in metaphysics as 
the idealistic atheism of Kant and • Coleridge ; 
the pantheism of Swedenborg, Schleiermacher, 
Schelling, and Hegel ; the schemes of their dis- 
ciples, Parker, ISTewman, Bushnell, Park, and 
Nevin ; and the development theory of J^ean- 
der and S chaff. 

The Journal treats largely also of the princi- 
ples of Biblical Interpretation, especially of the 
laws of figures and of symbols. A variety of 
other topics are likewise discussed in it, as may 
be seen from the titles of the articles in the 
several volumes. 

CONTENTS OF VOL. I. 

NO. I. 

IMPORTANCE OF A JUST UNDERSTANDING OF THE JROPHETIC 
SCRIPTURES. BY THE EDITOR — FALSE METHODS THAT HAVE 
PREVAILED OF INTERPRETING THE APOCALYPSE. BY THE 
EDITOR — THE LATE REVOLUTION IN EUROPE — DR. CHALMERs's 
SCRIPTURE READINGS — RELIGION TEACHING BY EXAMPLE — 
CRITICAL AND LITERARY NOTICES. 

NO. II. 

THE LAWS OF SYMBOLIC REPRESENTATION. BY THE EDITOR 

STRAUSS' AND NEANDER's LIFE OF JESUS CHRIST. BY THE 

EDITOR — MORELL's HISTORICAL VIEW OF THE SPECULATIVE 
PHILOSOPHY OF EUROPE. BY THE EDITOR — FLEMING'S RISE 
AND FALL OF PAPACY — CRITICAL AND LITERARY NOTICES. • 

NO. III. 

ANALYSIS OF THE PRINCIPAL FIGURES OF THE SCRIPTURES 
AND STATEMENT OF THEIR LAWS. BY THE EDITOR — MR. FA. 



COXTENTS. 187 



BER S SACRED CALENDAR OF PROPHECY. BY THE EDITOR — DR. 
spring's POWER OF THE PULPIT, BY R. W. DICKINSON, D.D— 
THE RELATION OF THE PRESENT DISPENSATION TO CHRIST's 
FUTURE REIGN. BY THE EDITOR — SPRATT AND FORBES's 
TRAVELS IN LYCIA, MILYAS, AND THE CIBYRATIS — MEMOIR OF 

MRS. MARY E. VAN LENNEP JOURNAL OF AN EXPEDITION INTO 

THE INTERIOR OF TROPICAL AUSTRALIA. MR. BICKERSTETH's 

SIGNS OF THE TIMES IN THE EAST — A WARNING TO THE WEST 
— LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. IV. 

MR. FABER's sacred CALENDAR OF PROPHECY. BY THE 

EDITOR — Alexander's earlier and later prophecies of 

ISAIAH. BY THE EDITOR DESIGNATION AND CLASSIFICATION 

OF THE FIGURES OF ISAL^H, CHAP. I. BY THE EDITOR — COLE- 
RIDGE's PHILOSOPHY OF CHRISTLA.NITY, AN ATHEISTIC IDEALISM. 

BY THE EDITOR TROTTER's EXPEDITION TO THE NIGER — • 

smith's voyage and SHIPWRECK OF ST. PAUL — LITERARY AND 
CRITICAL NOTICES. 

CONTENTS OF VOL. II. 

NO. I. 

A DESIGNATION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. H. BY 
THE EDITOR — THE RESTORATION OF THE ISRAELITES. BY THE 
EDITOR — DR. BUSHNELL's DISSERTATION ON LANGUAGE — THE 
CITIES AND CEMETERIES OF ETRURIA — NOEL's UNION OF CHURCH 
AND STATE — HOARE's HARMONY OF THE APOCALYPSE — LITE- 
RARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. II. 

DR. BUSHNELL's DISCOURSES — A DESIGNATION OF THE FI- 
GURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. IH. AND IV. THE RESTORATION OF THE 

ISRAELITES — UNITED STATES EXPEDITION TO THE JORDAN AND 
DEAD SEA — THE PRINCIPAL PREDICTED EVENTS THAT ARE TO 

PRECEDE Christ's coming — narrative of events in Borneo 

AND CELEBES — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES 

NO. III. 

MORELL's PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION — A DESIGNATION OF THE 
FIGURES OF ISALAlH, CHAP. V. AND VI FABER's SACRED CA 



188 CONTENTS. 

LENDAR OF PROPHECY — THE RESTORATION OF THE ISRAELITES 

SWEDENBORG's THEORY OF SYMBOLS AND LANGUAGE — LAY- 

ARD's NINEVEH — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. IV. 
MORELL's PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION — THE DANGERS AND 
DIFFICULTIES OF THE MINISTRY — OBJECTIONS TO THE LAWS OF 
SYMBOLIZATION — A DESIGNATION AND EXPOSITION OF THE FI- 
GURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. VII. — A HISTORY OF COLONIZATION ON 

THE WESTERN COAST OF AFRICA BEATTIE's DISCOURSE ON 

THE MILLENNIAL STATE OF THE CHURCH — LITERARY AND 
CRITICAL NOTICES. 

CONTENTS OF VOL. III. 

NO. I. 

MR. Steele's essay on Christ's kingdom — a designation 

AND EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. VHI. RE- 
SEARCHES IN ASIA MINOR, PONTUS, AND ARMENIA PROF. MC- 

CLELLANd's rules for the INTERPRETATION OF PROPHECY 

OBJECTIONS TO THE LAWS OF FIGURES — CRITICS AND CORRES- 
PONDENTS — MISCELLANIES — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NO 
TICES. 

NO. II. 
PROFESSOR park's THEOLOGIES OF THE INTELLECT AND THE 

FEELINGS MODERN SYSTEMS OF BIBLICAL HERMENEUTICS — ■ 

PROFESSOR CROSBY ON THE SECOND ADVENT — A DESIGNATION 
AND EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. JX. — DR. 
KEITH ON THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES — CRITICS AND CORRES- 
PONDENTS — MISCELLANIES — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. III. 

PROFESSOR STUART's COMMENTARY ON DANIEL — A DESIGNA- 
TION AND EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAPTER X. 
DOBNEY ON FUTURE PUNISHMENT — PROFESSOR AGASSIz's 

THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OF THE HUMAN RACE — THE ADVERB 

MISCELLANIES — CRITICS AND CORRESPONDENTS — LITERARY 
AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. IV. 

BROWN ON Christ's second coming — a designation anp 



CONTENTS. 189 

EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAPTERS XI. AND XII. 
OBJECTIONS TO THE LAWS OF FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE — 
THOUGHTS ON THE INTERPRETATION OF THE PROPHECIES — THE 
CHIEF CHARACTERISTICS AND LAWS OF PROPHETIC SYMBOLS- 
LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

CONTENTS OF VOL. IV. 

NO. I. 

BROWN ON Christ's second coming — a designation and 

EXPOSITION OF the FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XHL AND 
XIV. PHILOLOGICAL CONTRIBUTIONS — THE THEOPHANY CELE- 
BRATED PSALM XVin. REAL, NOT FIGURATIVE THE PAPAL 

POWER IDENTIFIED WITH THE LITTLE HORN OF THE FOURTH 
BEAST. DANIEL VH. — GOBAT's THREE YEARs' RESIDENCE IN 
ABYSSINIA — CRITICS AND CORRESPONDENTS — LITERARY AND 
CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. 11. 

BROWN ON Christ's second coming — a designation and 

EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XIV. 28-32. 

XV., XVI., AND XVII. FOREIGN MISSIONS AND MILLENARIANISM, 

AN ESSAY FOR THE TIMES — THE HOLY GHOST THE AUTHOR OF 

THE ONLY ADVANCEMENT OF MANKIND TODD's DISCOURSES ON 

THE PROPHECIES — FERG USSON's EASTERN ARCHITECTURE — 
LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. III. 

FAIRBAIRN's TYPOLOGY OF SCRIPTURE — THE ORIGIN OF THE 

SABBATH. BY R. W. DICKINSON, D.D., THE INTERPRETATION 

OF SCRIPTURE. BY E. POND, D.D., A DESIGNATION AND EXPO- 
SITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XVHL, XIX., AND 

XX. THE FULNESS OF THE TIME. BY JOHN FOESYTH, JUN., 

D.D. THE ORDER OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS THAT ARE TO 

PRECEDE Christ's coming — critics and correspondents — 

LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. IV. 

GENESIS, AND GEOLOGICAL THEORY OF THE AGE OF THE 
EARTH — THE SABBATH AND ITS MODERN ASSAILANTS. BY R, 



190 CONTENTS. 

W. DICKINSON, D.D., PROGRESS OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 

BY REV. D. INGLIS METAPHYSICAL AND GOSPEL TRUTH AND 

ERROR. BY THE REV. S. D. CLARK THE FIGURATIVE CHA- 
RACTER OF THE SACRED WRITINGS. BY E. POND, D.D. — LITE- 
RARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

CONTENTS OF VOL. V. 

NO. I. 

THE THEORY ON WHICH GEOLOGISTS FOUND THEIR DEDUC- 
TION OF THE GREAT AGE OF THE WORLD — A DESIGNATION AND 
EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XXI. — THE 
TRUE GOD KNOWN ONLY BY FAITH — DR. SPRING's DISCOURSES 
ON THE MILLENNIUM — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. II. 

THE SOURCES FROM WHICH THE MATERIALS OF THE PRESENT 

CRUST OF THE EARTH WERE DERIVED A DESIGNATION AND 

EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XXII. THE 

EXCELLENCE AND IMPORTANCE OF TRUTH. BY REV. S. D. 
CLARK — TENDENCIES OF THE TIMES — CRITICS AND CORRES- 
PONDENTS — ANSWERS TO THE OBJECTIONS OF GEOLOGISTS — THE 
SIXTH VIAL — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. III. 

DR. Hitchcock's religion of geology — the neglect op 
the sacred scriptures. by r. w. dickinson, d.d — dr. 
Wordsworth's lectures on the apocalypse — a designa- 
tion AND EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. 
XXHL THE FULNESS OF THE TIMES. BY J. FORSYTH, JR., D.D. — • 

MR. Williamson's letters to a millenarian — the re- 

ESTABLISHMENT OF THE NAPOLEON DYNASTY — LITERARY AND 
CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. IV. 

henry's life and TIMES OF JOHN CALVIN. BY R. W. DICK- 
INSON, D.D. DR. J. P. SMITH ON THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY — 

THE ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES. BY THE REV. W. C. FOAVLER — 
THE DOCTRINES OF DR. NEVIN AND HIS PARTY — CRITICS AN! 
CORRESPONDENTS — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 



CONTENTS. 191 

CONTENTS OF VOL. VI. 

NO. I. 
DR. J. P, SMITH ON THE GEOLOGICAL THEORY — THE REV 

•ALBERT Barnes's notes on revelation xx. 4-6. by the 

REV. H. CARLETON — THE PRINCETON REVIEW ON MILLENA- 

RIANISni: THE DISTASTEFULNESS OF CHRISTIANITY. BY THE 

REV. E. D. SMITH, D.D. — ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES. BY THE REV. 

W. C. FOWLER DR. NEVIn's PANTHEISTIC AND DEVELOPMENT 

THEORIES — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. II. 

LETTERS TO A MILLENARIAN — FALSE TEACHERS: THEIR 
CHARACTER AND DOOM — MERCANTILE MORALS — COMMENTA- 
RIES ON THE LAWS OF THE ANCIENT HEBREWS. BY E. POND, 

D.D. THE PRESBYTERIAN QUARTERLY REVIEW ON MILLENA- 

RIANISM THE ECLIPSE OF FAITH — THE REVIVAL OF THE 

FRENCH EMPERORSHIP — A DESIGNATION AND EXPOSITION OF 

THE FIGURES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XXIV THE SYMBOLS OF THE 

SIXTH VL&.L — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. Ill 

HIPPOLYTUS AND HIS AGE — THE REV. A. BARNEs's NOTES ON 

REVELATION XX. 4-6. BY THE REV. H. CARLETON THE 

DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT AS TAUGHT IN ISAIAH LIL, LHI. BY 

THE REV. E. C. WINES, D.D. CHRIST's SECOND COMING — THE 

INSPIRATION OF THE SACRED SCRIPTURES. BY THE REV. J. W. 

HALL, D.D. A DESIGNATION AND EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES 

OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XXV. AND XXVI — HENGSTENBERG ON THE SONG 
OF SOLOMON, BY THE REV. JOHN FORSYTH, JUN., D.D — THE 
FALL OF THE TURKISH EMPIRE — LITERARY AND CRITICAL 
NOTICES. 

NO. IV. 

Christ's second coming — inquiry into the meaning of 
matthew xxiv. 14. by the rev. john richards, d.d.^ 

BEECHER's CONFLICT OF AGES — INFIDELITY, ITS ASPECTS, 

CAUSES, AND AGENCIES. BY R. W. DICKINSON, D.D THE PRIEST 

AND THE HUGUENOT — HISTORY OF THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH — 
LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 



192 CONTENTS. 

COIS^ENTS or YOL. YII. 

NO. I. 

Christ's second coinxG — the synod of doet. by the 

EEV. E. POXD, D. D. THE GOVERXMEXT OF GOD VINDICATED 

FROM DR. BEECHER's ACCUSATIONS THE EMBARRASSMENTS 

OF THE ORTHODOX IN ASSAILING MILLENAEIAN^SM, BY EEY. 
H. CARLETcTn — HUGH MILLEr's LECTURE ON GENESIS AND 
GEOLOGY — A DESIGNATION AND EXPOSITION OF THE FIGURES 
OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XXYH. — THE TACTICS OF A CLASS OF 
ULTRA ANTI-MELLENAEIANS — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTI- 
CES. 

NO. n. 

THE TRUTH OF THE LAWS OF SYMBOLIZATION, AND THE IM- 
PORTANCE OF THEIR RESULTS — AN EXPOSITION OF ROMANS 
XI. 12, 15, 25. BY J. RICHARDS, D.D. — THE PARABLES OF THE 

NEW TESTAMENT TEffi APOSTOLIC COMMISSION. BY REV. J. 

HARKNESS THE PLURALITY OF INHABITED WORLDS — NOTES 

ON SCRIPTUBE. BY PHILO — A DESIGNATION AND EXPOSITION 
OF THE FIGURES IN ISAIAH, CHAP. XXVIH. HINTS TO ORTHO- 
DOX ANTI-MILLENAEIANS. BY A COUNTRY SUBSCRIBER — THE 
TACTICS OF A CLASS OF ANTI-MILLENARIANS — LITERARY AND 
CRITICAL NOTICES. . 

NO. in. 

DR. HICKOK's RATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY — NOTES ON SCRIPT- 
URE. BY PHILO THE LAWS OF SYMBOLIZATION, AND THEIE 

RESULTS IN INTERPRETATION THE PARABLES OF THE NEW 

TESTAMENT — A DESIGNATION AND EXPOSITION OF THE FIG- 
URES OF ISAIAH, CHAP. XXIX. THE PRLMITIVE PURITANS. BY 

J. FORSYTH, JUN. D.D. — THE RESURRECTION, THE CONFLA- 
GRATION, AND THE JUDGMENT THE WAR OF THE GREAT NA- 
TIONS — LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 

NO. IV. 

DR. HICKOK's RATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY — NOTES ON SCRIPT- 
URE. BY PHILO — THE LAWS OF SYMBOLIZATION, AND THEIR 
EESULTS IN INTERPRETATION — THE PARABLES OF THE N*EW 
TESTAMENT — THE SENTIMENTS OF DR. COTTON MATHER CON- 
CERNING Christ's second coming, by rev. h. carleton — 

A designation and exposition of the figures of ISAIAH, 

chapters XXX. AND XXXI. THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF 

PAUL THE ETHICAL SYSTEM OF THE BIBLE — THE WAR OF 

THE GREAT NATIONS LITERARY AND CRITICAL NOTICES. 



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